CHINA AND 

THE BOXERS 



A SHORT HISTORY ON THE BOXER 
OUTBREAK, WITH TWO CHAPTERS 
ON THE SUFFERINGS OF MISSION- 
ARIES AND A CLOSING ONE ON 
THE OUTLOOK. J' J> J' J' J' 



BY 



Rev. Z. CHAS. BEALS, 

Editor of '"''China Messenger ^^'' and Pastor of Grace Churchy Wuhu and Hai 

Shan Hsien^ China. 



M. E. MUNSON, Publisher and Bookseller, 

77 BIBLE HOUSE, NEW YORK. 



5086 



Library of Congresa 

Iwu Copies RerewEO 

JAN 11 1901 

Copyright entry 



SECOND COPY 

OeXvared to 

ORDER DIVISION 



copyright^ 1 90 1, 
By Z. Charles Beals. 






TO 

THE ME:M0RY of THE MANY MISSIONARIES AND NATIVE 

CHRISTIANS WHO HAVE NOT COUNTED THEIR LIVES 

DEAR UNTO THEMSELVES^, BUT HAVE GLADLY 

LAID THEM DOWN FOR CHRIST^ IS THIS 

VOLUME 

REVERENTLY DEDICATED. 




X, Ciux^f (finals- 



PREFACE. 



After being forced to leave his work in China, the au- 
thor felt compelled to publish in popular form a reliable 
book on the "Boxers," their origin, outrages and the 
world-wide commotion they have caused. As there had 
been many wild and groundless reports, he tried to ascer- 
tain the real facts and give to his readers the thrilling 
events as they occurred in order. 

The Boxer movement has been one of the grea iest 
cnmes of the nineteenth century. It has paralyzed not 
only China, but the world. Nor is the end yet in view. 
Every one should study to know the real cause of the 
present trouble, and so watch with interest future de- 
velopments. 

There is now no doubt but that there was planned in 
Peking by the heads of the Chinese Government one of 
the most fiendish conspiracies to drive out or exterminate 
all foreigners and Western civilization, and also stamp out 
every trace of Christianity from among the natives. 

Their plans were kept secret for a long time, but docu- 
ments have been secured which implicate the highest of- 
ficials. Instances were found where Governors and Vice- 
roys offered and even paid for the heads of foreigners 
from $30 to $100 per head. The Gnvprnnt^of J^h a r|-^ 9i ^ 
the h uman mon ater, beguiled into his Yamen (official 
residence), on the pretext of protection, fifty-one men, 
women and children, and then horribly butchered them m 



8 PREFACE, 

the most cruel and revolting way, and then claimed from 
Peking headquarters $ioo per head for the carrying out 
of his part of the programme. 

It is, therefore, of the utmost importance nationally, 
that these fiends should be known and dealt with, no mat- 
ter how high the official position ; for, if allowed freedom, 
they w^ould soon be placed in authority again. On the 
other hand, those who have shown such great kindness, 
such as the two Viceroys of the Yang-tsi Valley, Ch'ang- 
Chih-Tung and Liu-Kuan- Ye, and the Governor of Shen- 
si, with others, should be promoted and trusted in the 
future by the nations. 

We are indebted to some of the Shanghai and Japan 
papers for extracts which we have taken from them, and 
also to different writers, but especially to Mr. Charles 
Gammon, agent for the American Bible Society, Tientsin, 
who has written a small book, entitled "The Boxer 
Movement," and from which we have taken many valu- 
able thoughts and selections, the ist and 3d chapters be- 
ing almost entirely his ; also to Rev. Gilbert Reid, 
D. D., for his account of the siege, taken from the 
''Shanghai Mercury." 

The author has been nine years in China as a mission- 
ary, and understands the views which the Chinese hold 
regarding the foreigner, and with this experience he is 
able to present facts which he could not do if he had only 
been a visitor or globe-trotter. Much -has been omitted 
because of limited space, but enough will be found in this 
volume to give the reader a clear idea of events as they 
have transpired within the past year, and also a closing 
chapter on the present position and the future outlook. 
90 Covert Street, Brooklyn, N. Y. Z. Chas. Beals. 

Jan. 1st, 1901. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The greatest living issue before the church and the 
nations to-day is the Chinese question. At last China — 
conservative, secluded, selfish, heathen China — has over- 
stepped herself, and forced upon herself either the per- 
manent dictation of the more civilized nations or dis- 
memberment. Which horn of the dilemma she will choose 
it is impossible to forecast at present. Whether the set- 
tlement with the allied powers is near at hand, or, if so, 
whether it will be satisfactory, sufficient and wise, is 
problematical. 

At all events, the more light we can have thrown upon 
this vital subject by the platform, the pulpit and the press, 
the more profitable will it be to' the race and the cause of 
Christ. We, therefore, welcome this timely volume by 
Mr. Beals, and bespeak for it a warm reception, a wide 
circulation, a careful perusal and a prayerful, hearty 
''God-speed" on the part of its grateful readers. Infor- 
mation is the foundation for a sound conviction, sound 
conviction for a wholesome and safe agitation, and agi- 
tation for thorough and permanent purification. When 
the facts are known, the missionary will not be blamed 
for the uprising in China. The movement has been anti- 
foreign, and not primarily anti-Christian. It became 
anti-Christian only as the Christian missionary was, in- 
cidentally, a foreigner, and as the native Christian was 



10 INTRODUCTION. 

connected with him. But even if the missionary were 
wholly at fault, that would not change the Great Com- 
mission nor alter the responsibility of the church to evan- 
gelize China. While the marching orders of the Great 
Commander are, ''Go ye into all the world and preach 
the Gospel to every creature," every Christian is under 
infinite obligations, either in person or in spirit, to "go." 
No shrinking from danger, no fear of disruption, no 
dread of being misunderstood and misrepresented must 
deter him for a moment. The soldier may not disobey, 
nor even question, the Captain. The subaltern may not 
reason against the superior. Obedience is his ; the re- 
sults are God's. 

In due time the clouds hanging over China will be dis- 
pelled, the ancient nation will have been thoroughly 
scourged, she will enter upon a new lease of life, chast- 
ened and humbled; her doors will be thrown wide open 
to Civilization, commerce and Christianity, and her four 
hundred millions of people will stand on the same plane 
as those of the other nations, and from this great seething 
mass will come a great multitude, a mighty army, to swell 
the ranks of the elect number which s-hall make up the 
Bride of the Son of God. W. J. Hosier, 

Pastor Grace Gospel Church, 

Brooklyn. N. Y. 



THE BOXER ORGANIZATION. 



Chapter I. 

/The I-Ho-Ch'uan (Righteous Harmony Fists or Vol- 
unteer Bands), commonly called the "Boxers," is a secret 
society who made its present appearance over a year ago 
in Northern Shantung province. It rapidly attracted 
multitudes of men, both young and old, who formed 
themselves into small bands of gymnasts. Each band 
was conducted by a "demonized" leader, who, by the selec- 
tion of an epileptic patient or by the aid of hypnotism, 
caused a "medium" to display wild and unnatural symp- 
toms or to utter strange and peculiar speech, this serving 
as a basis for the claim of this society to spiritual power. 
Every follower was assured of immunity from death or 
physical injury — their bodies being spiritually protected 
from sword cuts and bullets. 

In order to present this matter intelligently, it will be 
necessary to give a brief summary of the uprising from 
its beginning. While confined principally to Shantung 
and Chihli Provinces, it affected seriously all Christian 
work in the North, and rapidly assumed vast proportions 
and spread like a forest fire from village to village. 

Most of the statements given below are those which 
have been communicated ofiicially to the Foreign Min- 
isters by the missionaries, and they do not include the re- 
ports of innumerable outrages of which we have not full 
information. 



12 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

( By the first of July of last year the Boxers had added 
vast numbers to their ranks, and all were armed with 
broad-swords, and in some cases with firearms. Gym- 
nastic exercises and drills were going on in hundreds 
of villages, and the Boxers soon announced their inten- 
tion of rising against the Roman Catholics. They rep- 
resented to the multitudes that the sympathies of the 
Government were with them, and adopted as a motto, 
''Exalt the Dynasty and extirpate the foreigners." One 
placard, which was widely circulated by them, read as 
follows : 

"THE UNIVERSAL BOXER SOCIETY. 

"You are personally invited to meet on the seventh day 
of the ninth moon, 

"Elevate the Manchus, 

"Kill the foreigners, 

"Unless this summons is obeyed you will lose your 
heads." 

'From the time this placard was issued the movement 
gradually grew into opposition to everything foreign, and 
the natives in both Catholic and Protestant churches were 
the sufferers. Hundreds of native families were rendered 
homeless, many were killed, and the Boxers, unchecked, 
looted and burned and robbed and killed until they were 
apparently beyond control. In December, in one district 
alone, the homes of twO' hundred families have been 
looted and burned, all available property confiscated and 
the sufferers forced to flee without food or sufficient 
clothing, in the midst of an unusually cold winter. Some 
were captured and held for ransom, others were taken 
to temples and forced to kneel before heathen idols, but 
many of them were taken in by missionaries and given 
such aid and protection as was possible. In the mean- 



THE BOXER ORGANIZATION. I3 

time the officials were wholly unmindful of the terrors 
surrounding them. Indeed, it is now known that the 
former Governor of Shantung (Yii Hsien) had encour- 
aged and aided the Boxers in their organization, and 
this with the approval of the Central Government. What 
seemed at first anti-Catholic, then anti-Christian, now 
proves to go deeper — it is anti-foreign. The Peking 
Government spoke of the Boxers as "patriots," formed 
as a sort of militia to prevent the encroachments of the 
Germans in Shantung and to support the Government. 
Thus the pillaging and rioting went on unchecked, not- 
withstanding repeated warnings and petitions both from 
the native sufferers and the missionaries. The Ministers 
promptly reported to the Tsung-Li-Yamen ( Foreign Bu- 
reau) all information received, but, in spite of polite let- 
ters from the Tsung-Li-Yamen, nothing was really done 
to put down the Boxers. On December 31st Mr. Brooks, 
of the English Church Mission, was captured by the Box- 
ers, mutilated and beheaded, and then the extreme gravity 
of the situation was revealed. 

If we go back two years we find the Germans required 
the dismissal of Li Ping-Heng, then Governor of Shan- 
tung, under whose rule two priests were murdered, and 
the edict in the Peking Gazette dismissing him contained 
the words "yung-pu-t'i-yung" (not to be mentioned for 
employment again). This same man also was put in a 
new and highly influential position, created for his sole 
use, where his power is almost unlimited. Recently this 
Li Ping-Heng, once in disgrace, but now in office and 
favor, was recommended to the throne as one loyal and 
patriotic and to be implicitly trusted. Yii Hsien, who 
succeeded him as Governor of Shantung, also left a track 
of ruin behind him and gave to the Boxers a new lease of 



14 



CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 



life. Such is Chinese duplicity — such is China's hopeless- 



ness. 



"he Manchu princes were surrounded at this time by 
Boxers, and half their retainers belonged to the associa- 
tion, and half of the palace servants were members of 
the same Boxer brotherhood. The Empress Dowager 




"boxers" reading placards. 

and the Emperor were attended by persons who did not 
read the newspapers, but repeated only court gossipi if 
they were asked for information. Half the court attend- 
ants, therefore, believed that a new era had dawned, 
which was to be anti-foreign. 

At this time many Boxer placards were posted up, 
calling upon the people to rise up and exterminate the 



THE BOXER ORGANIZATION. 1 5 

foreigners. The following one, a fair sample of many, 
was posted on the walls of Peking: 

''Our Emperor is about to become powerful. 

"The leader of the 'Boxers' is a royal (person. 

"Within three months all foreigners will be killed and 
driven away from China. 

"During forty years the Empire has become full of 
foreigners. 

"They have divided the land. 

"The Kwo-wen-pao (Chinese newspaper) always 
talks nonsense about the 'Boxers,' since it is under the 
protection of Japan. 

"¥.'e remind the Editors that hereafter they must not 
talk nonsense; if they continue to do so their building 
will be burnt. 

"The Brethren need not fear. 

"There are 100,000 ( ? E. G. A.) in the North. 

"When the foreigners are driven away. 

"We will return to our hills !" 

One of the many charges against officials in connection 
with the 1-Ho-L.h'uan rebellion is given below against 
H. E. Yii Hsien, late Governor of Shantung: 

"That knowing the existence of the I-Ho-Ch'uan in his 
province, on a large and threatening scale, a society 
wholly contrary to the Imperial laws, and in previous 
reigns severely punished, he took no steps to antagonize 
it. That after a fight had taken place in October, between 
the provincial troops and the Boxers, the said Governor 
was very angry that about a hundred of the latter had 
been killed, although told by military officials that the en- 
counter was unavoidable. That he encouraged the Box- 
ers by releasing the prisoners taken in that action, re- 
quiring no guaranty of good behavior, to the immediate 



l6 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

encouragement of the leaders, who had been ready to 
give up the cause after this fight. That he secretly pro- 
moted and fomented the rebellion by refusing to allow 
the troops to fight, repeatedly sending them into the 
field with these explicit orders. That his well known at- 
titude was immediately influential in strengthening the 
rebellion, and was the direct cause of the murder of the 
late Mr. Brooks, as much as if the late Governor had 
dispatched him with his own hand. That in a secret 
memorial to the throne he advocated the employment of 
the I-Ho-Ch'uan as an agency for driving foreigners out 
of the province, thus giving an ofiicial sanction to the 
movement." 

This Governor was afterwards transferred tO' Shan-si, 
and massacred over 250 foreigners and many thousands 
of native Christians. 

i^What we have stated will show that the Boxers' move- 
ment was, if not started by officials, soon taken up by 
them and received their protection. You have also now, 
on the above charge, insight into 'the state of affairs of 
Shantung province. We need hardly say that under these 
circumstances all religious work was at a standstill. The 
report that thousands of the Imperial troops had united 
with the Boxers at this time (particularly those under 
Prince Tuan) added a new and serious phase to the matter. 
In all sections it was anti-foreign, affecting mission- 
aries, native Christians and foreigners generally. The 
Edicts of the Empress Dowager to the people of Shan- 
tung, calling upon them to form militia for local and 
national defense, encouraged the lawless people to join 
the Boxers. This will be sufficient to give an idea of the 
formation of the Boxer movement, and will lead us up 
to our next chapter. 



REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT AND OUT- 
BREAK. 



Chapter II. 

Every great movement has usually a central cause. 
There may be many side issues, but they are not, as a 
rule, of sufficient force to cause a rising in themselves, 
however much they may tend to swell the number of mal- 
contents. The Boxer movement has unquestionably had 
as its chiei reason the hat£ed_jLnd_XQUtempt of the for- 
eigner. As such it received the smiles of the dominant 
party in Peking; on such it based its hopes of success. 
I think we may be safe in giving besides the first or great 
central cause five others which helped to bring to an is- 
sue the present state of things in China. Vit will give 
them in order, as follows : 

I First, or great central cause, contempt and hatred of 
foreigners. The reason for this hatred was brought 
about, firsts by abuse from foreigners themselves. Sec- 
ond, political "land grabbing." Third, oppression and law- 
suits by the natives who entered the church (especially 
Roman Catholic) for that purpose. Fourth, Boxer super- 
stition. Fifth, inability of our Consuls and Ministers to 
deal with Chinese officials as they should have been dealt 
with. 

All who have lived in China know how the foreigner 
and his ways have been despised. The poorest beggar on 



l8 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

the street would not exchange places with the best of 
them. All droughts, famine and pestilence of every kind 
is attributed to him. A translation of a Boxer placard 
which we give below will give some idea of what we 
mean : 

( ''Greater calamities still have overtaken the nation. 
Foreign devils come with their teaching and converts to 
Christianity, Roman Catholic and Protestant, have be- 
come numerous. Telegraphs and railways have been es- 
tablished, foreign rifles and guns have been manufactured, 
and machine shops have been a delight to their evil na- 
ture. Locomotives, balloons, electric lamps, the foreign 
devils think excellent. The Volunteer Associated Fists 
will have a row with the devils. They will burn down 
the foreign buildings and restore the temples. They will 
extirpate the evil demons and establish right teaching — 
the honor of the spirits and the sages — they will cause to 
flourish their sacred teaching. Within three years all will 
be accomplished. The bad will not escape the net and the 
goodness of the gods will be seen. The secrets of heaven 
are not to be lightly disclosed, but the days of peace to 
come are not unknown.'? 

(Millions of people therefore believed that the time 
had come to expel the foreigners from China. The con- 
tinuous drought and the imminence of famine is repre- 
sented by wilful agitators to be through the anger of the 
gods against foreign heresies and ways: 

(in many districts reports were spread as to emissaries 
of the foreigners going everywhere poisoning the water, 
and the poor deluded people, well nigh frantic with ter- 
ror, cleaned out their wells, guarding them day and night, 
planting red flags on their houses to keep away the evil 
influences, and, lastly, joining the Boxers, who taught 



REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT. I9 

that by the aid of their charms victory against the for- 
eigners was certain, when all their troubles would end. 

The foreigners in building their railways disturb their 
dead, so they claim, and this in itself is enough at any 
time to create a riot in China. Foreigners think nothing 
of removing their dead, but to the superstitious Chinaman 
it means much. This great hatred of all foreigners and 
foreign innovations, with contempt for the Yang-Keo-tsi 
(foreign dog), is the first great cause of the trouble. y 

WHY THIS HATRED? 

First, abuse from foreigners themselves. This point 
is best told by a Chinese gentleman, Mr. Wong-Kai- 
Kah, and what he says is not exaggerated, but put in a 
mild form. This kind of abuse is seen in any place 
where the foreigner lives. The Chinese are counted as 
dogs, made to be kicked, and kicks they get. There are 
exceptions, thank God, but even those are few and far 
between. Mr. Wong, in a letter to the ''North China 
News," says : 

'T read in your to-day's issue a short notice of an al- 
leged assault by four foreigners on the Bubbling Well 
Road on a messenger in uniform of the Chinese tele- 
graphs on the night before last. I have heard of late 
several instances of foreigners committing unprovoked 
assaults on the natives, and I have seen with my own 
eyes during the past two days two instances, which I will 
now relate. A shabbily dressed, emaciated and sickly-look- 
ing Chinese w'as walking along the edge of the sidewalk 
on Nanking Road when a foreigner walked up from be- 
hind, pushed him off the sidewalk and kicked him. There 
was plenty of room for the foreigner to walk past ; as I 
have said, the Chinaman was on the edge of the sidewalk. 



20 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

The other case occurred in Hongkew. A white-haired 
hawker, with a basket of mud dolls, was crossing the 
street when he met a foreigner coming from the opposite 
direction, who shoved him aside and with his stick struck 
the mud dolls, a few of which were smashed, not costing 
much perhaps, but they are the means of his livelihood. 

"In both cases the foreigners were decently dressed 
and endowed with all the physical qualifications that na- 
ture has to give, and in both cases the victims walked 
away without a word, but the sullen looks on their faces 
betrayed powerless rage and bitter resentment at the un- 
just treatment they had received. 

''Some foreigners in these settlements may, in the pride 
of their strength, consider the knocking about of natives 
simply a lark, and of no consequence. Yes, they may be 
safe enough when troubles come, but think of the mis- 
sionaries with their families in the isolated places, and 
think also of thousands of innocent Chinese who' will be 
involved in the general ruin. It would be too much on 
my part to ask such foreigners to come down from their 
lofty attitude, to be friendly tO' Chinese ; all I have tO' re- 
quest of them is to behave in a gentlemanly manner, 
which is taught them in their own families and in their 
schools. 

''I would thank you, Mr. Editor, for publishing this 
letter.' Should it ever meet the eyes of the two for- 
eigners whose exploits I have described, may they take 
no offense, but may they be more temperate in their ac- 
tions in future, and may they utilize their courage and 
prowess to better purpose for their own sake, for the sake 
of the interests of the commonwealth, and for the sake 
of the good reputation of foreigners in general. 

I am, etc., Wong Kai-kah. 




MR. CONGER^ U. S. MINISTER TO PEEKING, WHO WENT 
THROUGH THE SIEGE 2. PRINCE TUAN^ THE ""bOXEr" 
CHIEF. 3. MR. WU^ CHINESE MINISTER TO WASH- 
INGTON. 4. BURNING OF LEGATIONS AT PEKIN DUR- 
ING THE SIEGE. 5. BURNING OF TIENTSIN BY THE) 
BOXERS. 



REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT. 23 

Second, political ''land grabbing." There are matters 
to be considered which have had a great influence in 
bringing on this hatred and which has exasperated the 
Chinese beyond measure. 

There was the war with France of a few years agO' and 
the appropriation of a no small slice of Chinese territory, 
including Tong-King and Annam. There was the Japan- 
ese war, and China lost Formosa, which was followed in 
the appropriation by Russia of just so much of Man- 
churia as she might be disposed and able to occupy from 
time to time. There was the seizure of Kiao^chow by 
the Germans, followed by the friendly (?) ceding of 
Wei-hai-wei and Kow-loong to the British) the opening 
up of mines and railroads, which was thought by the 
Chinese (stupidly, of course, but nevertheless a very im- 
portant fact) to disturb the repose of the dead and bring 
calamity upon the living. Some of these innovations of 
civilization were introduced in a manner not calculated to 
quiet the prejudices of the Chinese or disabuse them of 
the tho\ight that their nation was certainly to be cut up 
into morsels for the benefit of the all-absorbing for- 
eigner^) 

' If v^e could but for a moment see ourselves as the 
Chinese see us, we should recognize at once that ou r un - 
blushing despoilment and_ 2roposed despoilment, thinly 
veiled under the phrase "spheres of influence," was suf- 
ficient to arouse the deepest animosity in the heart of 
every patriotic native, except such as have lost all hope 
of regeneration from within. 

Almost every paper published in China contains col- 
umns of ''How shall we divide China," etc., etc., which, if 
printed in any other country, would create riot and blood- 
shed, and the editor would be arre3ted as a traitor and 



24 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

banished from the land and the paper and building de- 
stroyed. Yet this has been going on for years in China. 
The officials have had these papers translated to them, 
and, naturally, in the highest circles, and even in the court 
itself the spirit of revenge and a determination tO' oppose 
this has arisen. The court, thus insulted, decided that the 
country could be saved from division by the powers by 
the help of the Boxers who claimed such wonderful pres- 
ervation from death. Therefore, on June 21st, Prince 
Tuan and Kang-Yi were declared to- be the Supreme 
Chiefs of the ''Volunteer Harmony Fists.") This Prince 
Tuan, if not a scholar and a politician, was at any rate 
a brave man, and worthy of a better end than that which 
he fatuously chose for himself. With more education and 
with wiser counsels than those of the execrable Kang-Yi, 
he might have done real good to the Empire, but now 
that he has nearly succeeded in bringing the dynasty to 
an end, he must suffer for his ignorance, pride and rash- 
ness. A semi-barbarian. Prince Tuan was really a pa- 
triot in his own savage way. And there was undoubt- 
edly an element of heroism in the man, who' sacrificed 
everything to realize his ideal, and who, stung by the 
indignities inflicted by the world, had the courage to 
challenge the civilized nations of the earth to wrest the 
irr|[perial sceptre from his hands. 

^Third, oppression and lawsuits by the natives who 
have entered the church (espiecially Roman Catholic) for 
that purpose. 

The right policy to follow in dealing with China is to 
insist on and enforce right and fair treatment of foreign- 
ers, absolute safety of the life of every law-abiding for- 
eign resident anywhere in China, also to demand and ob- 
tain security of foreign property, with absolute religious 



REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT. . 25 

toleration. But while all this is done the predisposing 
causes of trouble in the past that can be should be avoid- 
ed, and one of these is the mistaken, even well-meant, 
intervention of foreign missionaries in disputes or law- 
suits between their converts or adherents and other na- 
tives. There is no longer the slightest doubt that much 
ill-feeling has been aroused by the course of justice hav- 
ing, as many natives think, been averted by foreign in- 
fluence and interference. Hard as it may seem, all official 
status should be taken from religious teachers, of what- 
ever creed they may be. Absolute rules should be en- 
forced that any missionary attempting to interfere or 
intervene between natives in their various disputes should 
be first warned, and on repetition be deported^^Any cause 
of complaint he may think he has shoisM^e laid before 
his Consul, and dealt with through such proper repre- 
sentative. We have no right whatever, in the interests of 
any religion, to make converts aliens in their own coun- 
try. If religious teachers cannot make headway without 
what amounts to state patronage, then they must fail. 
Rarely is the missionary so constituted that he can exer- 
cise judicial functions, or even perform the duties of an 
advocate wisely. He must naturally be prejudiced in fa- 
vor of his adherents. 

If the foreign powers insist on China adopting abso- 
lute religious toleration, without any state patronage of 
any religion whatever, as in the United States and 
Canada, withdrawing from missionaries of any sort 
and all denominations, whether Taoist, Buddhist, Ro- 
man Catholic or Protestant, all special official status, 
a bone of contention would be destroyed and much done 
to insure peaceful conditions for foreigners in China in 
the future. A religion that in the last resort needs the 



26 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

intervention of arms to support its propaganda is not 
worth giving to any nation. Paul did not ask for any 
such help, and yet his missions were the most successful 
ever conducted. Christian truth is more powerful in 
making headway unaided by force than any admixture 
with the error of Crusading zeal in any degree whatever. 
Official status must ever in the last resort lead to armed 
intervention in its support or to those who claim it, fore- 
going their own nationality to obtain that of the country 
whO'Se fine features they desire. 

Official status was demanded from China by the Roman 
Catholic Church through the French Minister, and in an 
edict sent out by the Empress Dowager in 1899, all Chris- 
tion ministers were granted this status. A bishop now 
ranked with a viceroy and a priest with a Tao-tai. The 
Catholics quickly grasped this temporal power, but the 
Protestants almost to a man refused it, and they declare 
this to be not in accordance with their teaching.^ It is the 
old story of Rome seeking temporal power. The Cath- 
olic priests are ever intriguing, and the Chinese have long 
since been able to discern between the Catholics and 
Protestants. 

Very often, yes, almost always, lawsuits and oppres- 
sions are carried on without the foreigners' knowledge, 
and never found out. The natives have many ways to 
carry out their designs, such as stealing the missionary 
card, which means to the Chinese that the power and 
influence of the foreigner is behind it. Also the forging 
of cards, etc., to prove to the victim that he is carrying 
on this through the orders of the foreigner. A close 
watch, therefore, should be kept, not only on your neigh- 
borhood, but surrounding ones as well. 
[Fourth, Boxer superstition. The rise of the Boxer 



REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT. 2J 

movement is a fine illustration of the power of supersti- 
tion over the mind. European residents of the far East 
are expressing surprise that intelligent men, such as suc- 
cessful merchants, scholars and high officials, should 
really think it possible that the secret rites and incanta- 
tions of these fanatics have power to make them invul- 
nerable to attacks by sword, spear or Mauser bullets. 
Yet a little reflection will show that there is nothing re- 
markable in this credulity. It has not been so very long 
since Western people held very similar views. Two hun- 
dred years ago the belief in witchcraft was universal. 
Many of the most learned men in Europe and America 
thought it quite possible for a witch to transport herself 
at will from place to place and to use occult power for 
the injury of others or defense of herself, and the man 
who dared deny this found himself at once under sus- 
picion of heresy. The text, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch 
to live," was sufficient to hurry hundreds of innocent 
men and women to the gallows. The persecution of 
witches fortunately has been abandoned, but the super- 
stition which made such a persecution possible has not 
even yet wholly disappeared. Astrologers and mediums 
still have their victims, and the wearing of charms and 
amulets for protection against disease or the preserva- 
tion of life in battle or at sea is by no means uncommon. . 
If such credulity is far less common in the West than 
a hundred years ago, so that even peoiple who hesitate 
to sit down with thirteen at table or begin a journey on 
Friday, laugh at themselves and would fain share in the 
more wholesome scepticism which is abroad. 

The patient researches of men have discovered many 
of the secrets so long hidden from their knowledge. The 
mysterious operations of nature are no longer occult. 



\ 



28 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

Everywhere man is wresting from her the control of her 
mighty forces and using them for the blessing of his fel- 
lows. He finds forces operating according to fixed and 
immutable laws. 

■ A fine illustration of the change which has been 
wrought by science in the modern world is given in the 
recently published accounts of the observation at Algiers 
of the total eclipse of the sun not long ago. While noted 
astronomers, with all their delicate instruments, were 
carefully studying the phenomena, photographing the 
corona and gathering data for the solution of many im- 
portant problems, the native population was howling in 
the streets in abject misery, expecting the end of all 
things. Now, such a fanatical uprising as this of the 
Boxers is possible only where dense ignorance of natural 
law prevails. Movements equally preposterous have 
swept the West in less intelligent times. 

;We shall make a great mistake, therefore, if we treat 
the Boxer movement as something abnormal, alto- 
gether unrelated to the common beliefs and practices of 
the Chinese. It is but one manifestation of a supersti- 
tion that shows itself in a thousand forms, and only 
Christianity and civilization can effectually cure or de- 
stroy this malady. 

(Fifth, inability of our Consuls and Ministers to deal 
with Chinese officials. 

The Ministers in Peking have probably realized by 
this time that the Empress Dowager's coup d' etat was not 
merely the petty family squabble they affected to believe 
it was. Onlookers proverbially see most of the game. In 
central China we not only saw it ; we saw through it.) 
Next, therefore, to the partition error, and to what 
seemed to the Chinese mischievous assumpiton of au- 



REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT. 



29 



thority by the Roman Catholic missionary, we attribute 
our present difficulties to the mis judgment of events by 
our Consuls and Ministers. 

Time and time again have the Consuls and Ministers 
been advised to deal with officials as the source of riots, 




THE RECEPTION GIVEN BY THE EMPRESS DOWAGER TO THE 
LEGATION LADIES AFTER SHE HAD DI:P0SED THE EM- 
PEROR. 

etc., and not accept the heads of a few poor coolies (who 
in many cases were bought up for a few thousand cash) 
to expiate the crime of some official or gentry, as it was 
done in the first Tientsin massacre. At other times a few 



30 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

thousand Mexican dollars were received and the mur- 
derers cleared. Especially was this so in the Sung-pu 
case, and the settlement of the last called forth the fol- 
lowing prayer from an exile at Ichang: 
Because, O Lord, there is none other way 
Whereby we may escape these evil days, 
Because we are as jetsam on the strand, 
Forgotten of our country and our kin, 
We, who' join East to West, the pioneers 
Of many better days that are to be; 
Because we, ever toiling overseas. 
We who have sold our heritage, our all. 
Excepting certain ancient chartered rights 
To breathe Thine air and tread the common earth ; 
Now see these rights invaded day by day 
By the encroaching tide of pagan wiles. 
Of native insolence and savagery; 
Because the distant fate of Margary 
Is coming ever nearer to our doors. 
And deeds which once had set the world ablaze. 
Aye, even to the starting of Crusades, 
Are looked upon as commonplace and trite ; 
Because a murdered Christian does not bring, 
As did with Rome's proud citizens of old. 
Swift-footed vengeance on the slayers' track. 
But is atoned for by official lies 
And certain hideous payments of sycee. 
Which, on a rapidly descending scale. 
Will soon attain that meagre estimate 
At which they quoted sparrows long ago ; 
Because we know not whose it next shall be 
To guard his home against the howling mob. 



REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT. 3 1 

To be the victim of their fierce attack, 

And then of mild, politely-penned dispatch, 

To leave his mangled carcass in the street, 

With face uncovered, while the Consul sits 

In some Viceregal Yamen, over tea, 

Assessing the small value of the dead ; 

And last, because the sacredness of life 

Rests on nice points of quality and clothes ; 

Therefore it is, O Lord, that now^ we pray, 

When next the rabble moves to deeds of blood, 

Let not the pillage or the slaughter be 

Of Customs hireling or merchant churl, 

Or humble missionary, glad to gain 

Exit from trouble to a martyr's crown. 

But rather grant, when the incited mob, 

Like unleashed bloodhound, seeks its nearest prey. 

That it may find obtrusive on its path 

Some personage important to the state, 

Or high official representative, 

Some traveling faddist, potent in the press, 

Or information-gathering M. P., 

Some Anti-Opium League authority. 

Aristocratic trotter of the globe. 

Or human atom authorized to wear 

Gold lace upon the edges of his clothes. 

Upon whose taking off there shall ensue 

The steady tramp of solid infantry 

And inexpensive Chinese funerals ; 

That, with the thunder of artillery, 

And sack of goodly cities, there may be 

Restored again that wholesome deference, 

That usual and necessary respect 



32 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

Which, from the Asiatic, is our due — 

And thus, from evil, shall arise great good. 

— Tung Chia, in "Lays and Relays." 

It is right and just to say here that all consuls and min- 
isters are not alike, for we have notable examples to the 
contrary. We had two in Shanghai which deserve men- 
tion here, namely. Consul General Warren, of Great Brit- 
ain, and Consul General Goodnow, the American repre- 
sentative. They have been men of the hour. They are 
in China for the interest of their nationals, which, as far 
as looks go, cannot be said of all. They have shown 
great shrewdness and sense, and have a capacity to com- 
prehend situations and ability to adjust themselves to any 
condition or circumstance. Consul General Goodnow is 
just the man for the place, and, with his right hand sup- 
porter, the Vice Consul, Dr. John Hykes, who has spent 
over thirty years in China, we have had help and advice 
we could rely upon. America is weak in her consular 
force simply because politicians are sent out, in many 
cases, every four years, instead of men fitted for the 
position. W^hat we want is men who can pass a civil 
service examination and come to China and learn the 
language and Eastern ways of thinking for two or more 
years before taking up consular duties, and then let them 
work UjP in the service the same as men of other nations. 
Why, it takes four years to know anything about China 
as it should be known, let alone do anything. No mis- 
sionary society would trust one of their members to 
transact mission business with the people until after re- 
siding three or four years in the country. How much 
more, then, should the consuls who do business for a 
mighty nation know the people and their ways. 



Reasons for the movement. J^^ 

What business house in the world would allow a green 
hand to take up the important and difficult positions first ? 
Why, none ; their men would have to work up and show 
themselves worthy. Then, why, in the name of common 
sense, should green hands be put to the head of affairs 
that they know nothing about. I say nothing emphatic- 
ally, for the Asiatic has neither had the opportunities nor 
training of the Westerner during the last 500 years, and 
to attempt to regulate our intercourse with them on the ^ 
lines with which the mutual relations between the various 
leading countries are conducted is folly. It is to be hoped 
that soon, very soon, these consular appointments will be 
taken out of politics and placed on a common sense plat- 
form — "civil service" — and serve for the nation, not 
party. 

In referring to the exile's prayer, let us say that as 
loxig as there was uncertainty about the Ministers' safety 
in Peking all the nations were for destruction and ex- 
termination, but when relieved, what then? When the 
question of relieving missionaries at Poo-ting-fu or find 
out if they were dead or alive, the answer came : ''They 
are only missionaries !" Ah ! that has been the trouble. 
''Only another missionary gone; what does it matter?" 
Nations have, therefore, not been strong for honor and 
life, but — does it pay? will it help trade? Or, if they do 
demand retribution, is it the punishment of the crim- 
inals? No, but a few dollars or a slice of territory. 

This should not be done in the future, but the crim- 
inals should be dealt with severely. Minister Wu in one 
of his addresses stated that Christians and the Christian 
nations are crying out for vengeance when, according 
to their teaching, they should be willing to accept almost 



34 



CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 



any terms. We might call to his honor's mind this fact, 
that, although God is a God of love He is also a God of 
justice, and He has decreed that he that taketh the sword 
shall perish by the sword. 




BEGINNING OF TROUBLE AND SENDING UP 
OF LEGATION GUARDS. 



Chapter III. 

Mr. Gammon, of Tientsin, writes : "For many months 
Boxer bands were increasing and countless outrages 
committed ; but these wqre confined to native Christians, 
and did not give cause for strong action on the part of 
the foreign ministers, though they did all that lay within 
their power to cause the Chinese Government to suppress 
them. Men, women and children were put to death out- 
right, after being robbed and tortured and their homes 
destroyed. Disturbances, though frequent and plentiful, 
were in distant and more or less isolated places, from 
which reports were slow in reaching us, and rendered 
untrustworthy by the transforming imaginations of the 
Chinese. For this reason visitors to the North were de- 
ceived by surface appearances, and while exaggerated re- 
ports were spread, many of these observers were driven 
to the other extreme, and pronounced a comparative calm 
where better informed people could detect the rumbling of 
a volcano soon to burst into flame. From many stations 
in the interior where native churches were established 
came tales of persecution, sometimes confined to one man 
alone, and in other cases whole families and whole vil- 
lages suffering loss of life and destruction of property. 



36 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

In view of the rapid and gigantic increase both of the 
Boxers and their nefarious operations, we had come to 
look for a sudden crisis, and this was soon reached. For 
a long time past Pao-ting-fu and vicinity (in Chihli) were 
the center of organization for the Boxers, and it was 
near that city that a village of native Catholics made, 
from the roofs of their houses, a successful defense 
against an attack by the Boxers, killing seventy of their 
number, with but little loss tO' themselves. 

Another fierce attack on Catholic converts was in the 
vicinity of Pao-ting-fu, at a village called Kao-lo, thirty 
li from Tsing Hsien, and also at another place some ten 
li from Tang-shu. The Christians were holding service, 
when the chapel was attacked by Boxers, the doors fast- 
ened and the building fired, and over one hundred per- 
ished. This would easily account for the great loss of 
life. It was, therefore, in the Pao-ting-fu district that 
we expected the beginning of a great uprising, and in this 
we were not mistaken. 

THE DE^STRUCTION OF THE RAILWAY AND LANDING OF 

FOREIGN TROOPS. 

On Sunday, May 27th, 1900, a large body of men, 
armed with knives, clubs and a few firearms, marched up 
the line of the Pao-ting-fu Railway stations. A portion 
of the line was destroyed, the telegraph cut, and by Mon- 
day morning six stations were burned, including the 
homes of Chinese residents and the shops of native mer- 
chants. 

A panic ran along the line long before the arrival of 
the Boxers, and the places destroyed were mostly de- 
serted in time to save life. -Native refugees came pour- 
ing into Tientsin, leaving their homes, shops and the 
property of the railway unprotected and unwatched. At 



BEGINNING OF TROUBLE. 37 

Feng-tai, the junction of the Peking and Pao-ting-fu 
Hnes, there was a group of foreign houses (the homes of 
foreign railway employees), a roundhouse, containing 
several locomotives, large car and machine shops, store- 
houses, a small village of native houses and shops and a 
large station building, all of which v^re looted and 
burned, the residents fortunately escaping by train to 
Tientsin. 

The news of this rioting and destruction brought tem- 
porary chaos to Peking and Tientsin. Immense crowds 
assembled at the stations and in the streets, eagerly dis- 
cussing the ever-changing reports that came from a mul- 
titude of sources. Excitement ran high, and there was 
a general feeling of alarm, not for residents in either of 
these cities, but for the many missionaries and colpor- 
teurs in distant and isolated places, especially those in 
Pao-ting-fu, with whom communication by rail and by 
telegraph was entirely cut off. 

Application was made to the Chinese Government for 
permission to land marines and sailors from the men-of- 
war arriving, and to quarter them in Peking, and when 
the Tsung-Li-Yamen (Foreign Office) replied that 
Prince Chung must first be consulted, the Minister sent 
word that, with or without permission of the officials, 
they would land and station at Peking. Admiral Kempff, 
on the U. S. F. S. Newark, had arrived at the mouth of 
the Pei-ho (sixty miles from Tientsin by river, thirty 
miles by rail) on Sunday, June 3d, but, knowing nothing 
of what was taking place, did not land men at once. The 
reports of Monday being confirmed, our Consul imme- 
diately telegraphed the facts to the Admiral, who landed 
100 men, two machine guns and a field piece, within one 
hour after receiving the Consul's message. 



38 



CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 



With the exception of a small party of Japanese, who 
came during the forenoon, the American sailors and 
marines were the first to arrive. On Wednesday guards 
from the ships of five nations had landed here, and per- 
mission was then sought to send a portion of them to 
Peking, but the Viceroy and Peking officials iput every 
obstacle in their way. On Thursday, however, the Chi- 
nese officials, finding further resistance useless, granted 
permission for thirty men of each nationality to go by 




REV. NORMAN AND ROBERTSON^ 
MARTYRS 

train and station themselves at their respective legations, 
and at 4 o'clock a special train conveyed them to Peking, 
and guards of like strength were left in Tientsin. Na- 
tive refugees fled to Tientsin for safety, all of them leav- 
ing their homes in ashes, and many of them after having 
seen parents, wives and children hacked to pieces by the 
heartless mobs. Many villages about Peking have been 
sacked and the Christians exterminated. A large propor- 
tion of the refugees were formerly prosperous men, but 
they are now destitute. 



BEGINNING OF TROUBLE. 39 

Two more English missionaries, Messrs. Norman and 
Robinson, were slaughtered. Mr. Robinson was killed 
soon after his capture, after having been tortured, while 
Mr. Norman for a time was held for a ransom of 40,000 
taels. Before terms could be offered or a rescue party sent 
out, however, he, too, was murdered. A party of French 
and Belgian engineers, with their wives and children, at- 
tempted to flee from Pao-ting-fu and embarked for Tien- 
tsin on native boats, but the news of their coming went 
before them, and they were obliged to fight their way 
desperately through every village. They killed a number 
of Boxers and received several wounds, and were finally 
obliged to leave their boats and walk to Tientsin, which 
they did after three days, living on river water and rice. 
They reached Tientsin in a terrible condition, the ladies 
with bleeding feet and several wounds, and the men suf- 
fering from various injuries. Unfortunately, some of 
their number had become separated and left behind and 
were killed. The head of a Frenchman was seen mounted 
on a pole not far from Tientsin, and later the bodies of a 
man and his wife were found, the woman having been 
terribly cut with knives. 

The missionaries at Pao-ting-fu refused to leave at this 
time, and they were all murdered on June 30th, 1900. 

The railway authorities fought hard to maintain com- 
munication with Peking (the heads of the departments 
being British), but the line was interrupted by the burn- 
ing of bridges and stations, and trains frequently re- 
turned, unable to get through. Three more stations were 
destroyed in as many days and two bridges burned, each 
time a step nearer to Tien-tsin. The Chinese troops sent 
to guard the line failed to accomplish anything, and even 
if they were not then in sympathy with this anti-foreign 



40 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

movement and members of the Boxer society, there is 
every reason to believe that they had secret instructions 
not to resist or punish the Boxers. Meanwhile the pow- 
ers were daily landing sailors and marines, and Tientsin 
was one great military post, full of moving patrols and 
guards stationed at every vulnerable point. 
""~^he Boxers assembled by thousands, coming in bands 
of 50 to 100, and sometimes 500, from every point of the 
compass. It was for the people of Peking, Pao-ting-fu, 
Tung-chow and other points in the interior that we were 
anxious. The Chinese were in a very excited state, and 
to enter the native city would mean certain death to any 
foreigner. Reports were circulated that we had poisoned 
the wells and food and that we had cast spells on families 
and houses. Medicine to counteract these evils was sold 
at high prices, and the foreigner was both hated and 
feared. Printed red circulars, stating that we were using 
the eyes of children for medicine, and stories far more 
horrible, and calling upon men to rise and ''sweep the 
foreign devils into the sea," were freely distributed, in- 
citing the people to more fanaticism and striking terror 
to the hearts of peaceful natives. It seems strange to 
walk the streets armed and tO' sleep with rifles, revolvers 
and belts of ammunition by the bedside, but that is what 
we were forced to do. Perhaps the foe that we had 
most to dread in Tientsin was fire, for that we could not 
fight with troops or gunboats. Repeated attempts were 
made from time to time to fire prominent buildings. 

Some Christians recanted to save their lives, and were 
saddled and bridled and forced to crawl to the temple 
idols, where every indignity was heaped upon them, but 
be it said to the glory of the church in China and the 
power of the Word, that thousands have given their lives 



BEGINNING OF TROUBLE. 4 1 

for Christ's sake, and have been true and steadfast to the 
end, while others have not hesitated to join the church to 
share in the persecution. 

On June 7th twenty-five American marines from the 
U. S. S. Monoca£y were landed. Two men-of-war 
arrived and landed men also, an elaborate defense of the 
settlement was arranged for, and the streets barricaded. 
The railway tracks had been torn up, and as the em- 
ployees had deserted the stations, no details of the damage 
done were received, nor could repairs be made. Peking 
was, therefore, cut off. 

Edicts from the Empress Dowager pat the Boxers on 
the back, and General Nieh, the only man who has really 
tried to do his duty,- is to be reprimanded, while Tung 
Fu-Hsiang, the most anti-foreign general in the army, 
and the one who has done most to foster the Boxer so- 
ciety, is to be at the head of the troops. That the sol- 
diers received distinct orders not to fire upon the Boxers 
has been proved in many ways. 

TiENTSiN_, June 10. 

Late last night telegrams were received from the Min- 
isters that matters looked very serious in Peking, and 
asking for the immediate dispatch oi troops by any and 
every possible means. A consular meeting was held at 
midnight, in which the naval officers of the defense took 
part, and it was decided to take, by force if necessary, the 
railway and to run a train through by constructing the 
line. Early this morning the troops were on the move, 
and two trains, with rails, sleepers and constructors, and 
carrying a thousand troops, with large supplies of am- 
munition, field pieces and machine guns, were sent off. 
The Viceroy finally gave permission for the use of the 
railway, but they soon rnet with great opposition. It was 



42 



CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 



understood that the Ministers consider their Hves in dan- 
ger, and that if the troops got through all the foreigners 
there would be sent to Tientsin. The Russians and 
French refused to co-operate, but this morning there were 
no less than four hundred Russians to go and a large 
number of French, as well as Italians, Austrians, Amer- 
icans and British. Five hundred British were sent, and 




PART OF ADMIRAL SEYMOUR S RELIEF COLUMN. 



also one hundred men who were here from American 
ships. FresTTtroops were sent up the line as fast as the 
men could be brought and trains made ready. In the 
meantime we had less than fourteen hundred troops in 
Tientsin, with more to^ come. Capt. McCalla was in 
charge, but afterwards it was decided that Admiral Sey- 
mour should command the expedition to Peking, which 
left Tientsin on the morning of the tenth. 



ADMIRAL SEYMOUR'S RELIEF COLUMN. 
By a U. S. Officer. 



Chapter IV. 

What is known as the Seymour Relief Column has be- 
come so famous that a detailed account of that cam- 
paign by a participant and eye-witness may be of interest 
tO' many. 

The Allied Forces from the various men-of-war lying 
at Taku, under the command of Admiral Seymour, left 
Tientsin on trains for Peking about 9 A. M. Sunday, June 
loth, with the object of escorting the several Ministers 
from Peking to the ships. 

The force was about 2,100, divided approximately as 
follows : Russians, 600 ; British, 500 ; Germans, 400 ; 
Americans, 200J. Japanese, 150, and the balance between 
the Italians, French and Austrians. Having two heavy 
trains, and the necessity of keeping as near together as 
possible, made our progress rather slow. Shortly after 
noon we passed Yang-tsun, a distance of sixteen miles 
from Tientsin, without having met with any opposition. 

At Yang-tsun there were 3,000 Imperial Chinese 

troops, all armed with the latest improved Maunlicher 

rifle, but they all appeared very friendly, and we stopped 

there for half an hour and the men bought eggs and 

fruit. 



44 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

About five miles above Yang-tsun we met our first op- 
position, and I had my first "pop" at a genuine Boxer, 
There was a small body of them engaged in tearing up 
the track. We fired on them, killing four, and the rest 
took to their heels. It took us most of the balance of the 
afternoon to repair the track, so the train was at a stand- 
still there until the next morning. 

Not until we had gone nearly two miles ahead of the 
train did we see anything alarming, but just as we had 
decided to push on to Lang-fang, we saw a body of 
Boxers, whose number we estimated at about 1,200, 
streaming out of a large village on the left of the line and 
making for another village lower down, with the inten- 
tion of cutting us off from the trains. We kept up a run- 
ning fight with them for a distance of a mile and a half, 
dropping some thirty of them. When within 700 or 800 
yards of the trains we halted on the railway embankment, 
and gave them so hot a magazine fire that we drove them 
across the right front of the bluejackets, where they 
were exposed to a severe fire from the Centurion's Maxim 
and rifles. No men, however brave, could have stood the 
punishment, and the Boxers fled, leaving some 450 dead 
on the field. 

One cannot withhold a tribute of admiration to the 
gallantry of these poor wretches, armed mainly with 
spears and swords, in attempting to rush in open daylight 
a trainload of disciplined European troops, armed with 
all the most modern weapons. 

At night our men had to sleep on top or under the 
cars, or any place that they could spread their blankets. 

The next morning we started bright and early, only to 
find that a number of rails had been removed and had to 
be relaid. In some places it would be only a couple of 



ADMIRAL Seymour's relief column 45 

rails, but in others there would be several hours' hard 
work. The men went at it with a will, and there was 
scarcely any growling, which ''Jack," as a rule, considers 
his special privilege. 

During Monday we made about fifteen miles advance, 
and were not attacked by the Boxers. Tuesday was a 
repetition of Monday, except that we could see a great 
many Chinese way off in the distance, and had a little 
scrimmage with a band of about forty or fifty, killing 
fourteen of them. Camped Tuesday night at Lo-fa, 
where there is a switch and sidetrack running into a 
walled enclosure. The company from H. M. S. En- 
dymion fortified that enclosure and mounted some Nor- 
denfeldt and some Maxim guns on the w^alls, and called 
it Fort Endymion. 

Wednesday morning we started, leaving a garrison of 
about 120 British bluejackets in Fort Endymion. Our 
progress on that day was even slower than on the pre- 
vious day, and we went only about twelve miles to a sta- 
tion where there had been a water tank, but it had all 
been destroyed by the Boxers, and the boys had to water 
the engines by hand. We camped there that night, and 
early the next morning, just as we had finished breakfast, 
we were attacked by a large body of Boxers, estimated 
to be about 1,200 or 1,500. In some way that I can 
scarcely understand they were almost upon us before the 
alarm was given, and for a few minutes it looked as if 
they were going to drive us. There were eight Italian 
seamen out foraging unarmed, and five of them were cut 
down. The Boxers were armed only with swords and 
spears, but in their fanaticism they kept coming right 
forward, to be mowed down by the rifles, and it finally 
became a regular hand-to-hand fight, with our bayonets 



46 



CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 



against their swords and spears. There were some 
ghastly sights on the field that day, as they simply would 
not stop fighting as long as there was any breath in 
them. I counted 162 on the field, and there is no know- 
ing how many more crawled away and died of their 
wounds. 




SIEGE TRAIN ON WAY TO PEKIN. 



That same afternoon a few of the cars were detached 
and, with a strong guard, took Admiral Seymour and his 
staff about ten miles further up the road, when they came 
to a place where the track was torn up and the grading 
embankment leveled for a distance of two or three miles. 
While that section was out reconnoitering, four British 



ADMIRAL Seymour's relief column 47 

bluejackets came flying up the road on a handcar from 
Lo-fa with word that Fort Endymion was being attacked 
by overwhelming numbers. You may know that it did 
not take us long to back that train down there and "sail 
in." We had a big time there for a few minutes, and 
the Boxers just dropped in bunches. We counted 230 
dead on the field there and, aside from the five unarmed 
Italians that were killed in the morning, we had no losses 
that day. After the fight we ran the train back to the 
water tank and camped there again that night. 

The next day (Friday, June 15th) we tried to send a 
train back to Tientsin under Paymaster Jewett for sup- 
plies, but he returned late in the afternoon, reporting the 
road and bridges so badly destroyed that it was impos- 
sible for him to go through. There was a council of 
war that night, and the next morning we started to back 
the train and make the best of our way to Tientsin. 

We left about 120 Germans, strongly fortified, at a sta- 
tion, with an engine to bring them in, if necessary. Also 
at Lo-fa we left the British garrison in Fort Endymion. 
1 lemember saying while passing those two fortified posts 
that it would take a horde of Chinamen to drive them 
out, and yet, late that evening, they were all driven in 
and joined us with their trains, bringing in twenty-two 
wounded and leaving six dead on the field. They were 
driven in by Imperial troops, armed with the best of mod- 
ern rifles. 

On Sunday, the 17th, our progress was verv slow, the 
track being almost a total wreck. We were at a standstill 
all day Monday beside an irreparable bridge over the 
Pei-ho River. I could begin to see that some of the 
oflicers were not as sure of the outcome as they would 



48 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

like to have us believe, and to-day we began to serve out 
half rations. 

As the bridge was irreparable, it was decided to aban- 
don the train. So, on the 19th, we left the train, putting 
the wounded into boats, with the intention of following 
the course of the river to Tientsin. It was a long, slow 
job detraining and forming the column, and it was well 
along in the afternoon before the last detachment left 
the cars. We only went about three or four miles before 
going into camp for the night, and as soon as it was dark 
we could see the flames of the deserted train, which was 
being destroyed by the enemy. We began our march at 5 
o'clock the next morning, and about 5 130 I saw a 
number of red and white banners floating among some 
trees a little over a mile away. I called the paymaster's 
attention to them, and just as he was looking I heard, for 
the first time in this campaign, the whistle of rifle bullets, 
and the fight was on — the fight of our lives to reach Tien- 
tsin. """^ ' 

Before I go further it might be well to give some idea 
of the form.atiori of the column. There were bu t fou r- 
teen United States mar inps. who had been sent up more 
as a train guard for a -supply train, and that little band 
of fourteen acted as a sort of advance guard, being any- 
where from a quarter to half a mile ahead of the rest. 
Following them was the United States three-inch field 
piece, with its crew of about forty bluejac kets from the 
U. S. S. Newark , and they were supported by the rest of 
the Newark battalion. Then followed the British marines 
and the British bluejackets, with their field pieces and 
machine guns ; then the Germans, the Japanese, the Ital- 
ians, French and Austrians, while the Russians were the 
rear guard to defend the boats containing the wonnded, 



ADMIRAL Seymour's relief column 49 

The first shot fired after we left the train was fired by 
the U. S. three-inch fie ld piece at a 2,ooQ-yard range, and 
was as pretty a shot as I have ever seen, landing a shrap- 
nel right among a crowd at the foot of a flagstaff over a 
mile away. That shot rather scattered them, and we ad- 
vanced slowly, fighting every foot of the way. 

The grave mounds and mud fences made first-class 
cover for us, and we fought from one mud fence to an- 
other, driving the Chinese before us. They made a very 
determined stand in a village, and it took us hours of 
hard fighting to dislodge them. We were having more or 
less killed and wounded all the time, which made our 
progress correspondingly slower. We advanced into a 
village with the American three-inch and Endymion's 
machine guns. The enemy soon had range, and dropped 
shells into the village, some falling unpleasantly close, one 
in particular bursting in the street where our guns were 
drawn up, but without hurting any one. The village was 
cleared with much difficulty, and then the enemy retired 
and took up their position in the next village. The Ger- 
mans and Russians on the left bank began their advance 
at 10:15. ]\Iany of the enemy threw away their weapons 
and ammunition, of which a good deal was taken by our 
men. At 2 P. M. we passed through Pei-tsang, with op- 
position all the time, every foot being disputed. The 
fighting during the whole day was of the severest de- 
scription, the enemy hanging on to his cover with the 
greatest tenacity. From a prisoner brought in we learned 
that Tientsin Avas exceedingly hard pressed, having had 
almost continuous fighting for the past five days. It was 
very evident that we could hope for no help from that 
quarter. The greatest- matter for aii^^iety was the am- 



50 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

munition supply. If finished, the cokimn would soon be 
finished also. 

The great difiiculty our men experienced on Wednes- 
day was the inability to locate the whereabouts of the 
enemy's artillery, owing to their using smokeless powder. 
Fighting lasted continuously from 8:15 A. M. until dark- 
ness set in. At 7:45 a shell burst close over our boats, 
wounding severely a German seaman, who was sitting on 
the deck of the boat containing their wounded. 

Thursday, the 21st, was a repetition of the continuous 
fighting of the 20th, with the added element of danger 
and death from shells and shrapnel that were being 
thrown in our midst by some fort out of sight way down 
the river. 

In the afternoon we were told to stand by for a long 
march all night, as we were to try and steal by the fort in 
the darkness. We took such rest as we could till about 
10:30 P. M., when we started silently down the bank of 
the river in "column of twos." 

It was pitch dark, and I seemed to realize the gravity of 
the situation more than ever before. We had been hear- 
ing the ''boom," ''boom" of heavy guns ever since we had 
left the train. It was by no' means certain that we would 
find Tien-tsin in the hands of friends, if we would be 
able to reach there. 

About I o'clock in the morning we came to a village sit- 
uated on both sides of the river, the banks of which at 
that place were almost perpendicular and about twenty 
feet high. We were stealing along at the water's edge in 
the dense blackness, when, without a word of challenge 
or warning, volleys were fired into us, or at least in our 
direction. Mercifully, there were none of the men in the 
ranks hit, but three of the poor wounded fellows in the 



ADMIRAL SEYMOUR S RELIEF COLUMN 



51 



boats were killed. The only way I can account for that 
is that those in charge had failed to unship the mast of 
the boat, and as I looked back that night all I could see 
was that mast, standing out clear and distinct against the 
sky line. 

We did not fire one shot in return, but the British 
marines charged through the town upon their flank and 
took it at the point oif the bayonet. We marched through 
that town, and had gone but a mile or so when day began 




BRINGING THE W0UNDE:D DOWN THE PEI-HO. 



to break. We were marching along the top of a bank 
that was a sort of levee, and I could just see acro'ss the 
river, about sixty yards away, a man walking up and 
down. I called the paymaster's attention to it, and he at 
first thought it was one of the Germans, as they had been 
on that side of the river most of the way. It was rapidly 
getting lighter, and we soon saw that it was a Chinese 
officer in full uniform, while about every five feet I could 
see the head and shoulders of Chinese soldiers, evidently 



52 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

in rifle pits behind the ramparts, and a number of heavy 
>-uns and Hght machine ones, with their gun crews stand- 
ing by them. 

The httle band of marines and about twenty U. S. 
bluejackets were all that were in sight at the time. One of 
the men saw a Chinaman with a rifle going across the 
bottom land back of us, and he took a shot at him. The 
echo of the shot had not died away before every big gun 
and everything else they had was turned loose on us, and 
a four-inch Krupp shell plowed into the ground within 
six feet of me, but fortunately did not explode. 

All hands at once dropped down below the edge of the 
levee, and we had as good a fort to fight from as the en- 
emy had. We made it our point from the beginning not 
to let them serve their guns, and that first volley was the 
only time their big guns were used. 

We were not more than sixty to seventy-five yards from 
them, and it was hot work for about an hour. The man 
next to me on my left had a ball right through his capi, 
which gave him an ugly scalp wound that bled freely. I 
bandaged it up with his "first aid," and he went right on 
fighting. While we were keeping the enemy occupied in 
this way, a party of British marines and bluejackets, 
about 300 strong, crossed the river a mile or so above the 
fort, and, by making a long flanking march, came upon 
the fort from the rear, where it was not guarded, and got 
inside. Before those engaging us knew what happened 
to them, they were between two fires, and there was a 
regular panic ; their own guns were turned on them, and 
they went over the bank like rats. The fort was known 
as the Se-ku Arsenal, and covered many acres of ground. 
It was full of arms and ammunition, much of it of the 
very latest pattern, and more were found in nearly all the 



ADMIRAL Seymour's RELIEF column. 53 

houses we passed through. During the forenoon it was 
decided to hold the captured forts, and send in a small 
force of marines, with Mr,_Currie as a guide, to endeavor 
to enter the foreign settlement, starting at 9 P. M. At 
about I P. M. the enemy attacked the captured arsenal 
with between 5,000 and 6,000 men. Our firing line was re- 
inforced to a strength of 700. A gun belonging to the 
enemy, placed on a railway bridge some 2,uoo yards away, 
caused us considerable annoyance. The fighting was of 
the most desperate character, the Chinese troops making 
several most determined rushes, which were gallantly re- 
pelled by our men. The attack was finally repulsed by 
about 2 :45 P. M., and our men chased the enemy for 
some distance across the country, burning the adjacent 
villages, which were likely to afford cover to them. 

After allowing us to spend a quiet night, the enemy be- 
gan by an attack on us at 4 :20 A. M. Our casualties were 
becoming very frequent, and it was perfectly heart-rend- 
ing to see the ghastly procession of poor, mangled fellows 
led and carried in. Captain Beyts, R. M. A., and two 
men were rushed by the enemy and killed. At 2 A. M. 
the marines who essayed to get through to Tientsin, re- 
turned, having been nearly cut off by strong bodies of the 
enemy ; they had lost four killed and two wounded. 

The loss of the Chinese was estimated at about 600 
during the taking of the fort and about 400 more when 
they tried to regain it. 

Now that we had possession of the fort, all we could do 
was to hold it until relieved, as we could not hope to pass 
down the river right under the walls of Tientsin. We 
sent up red rockets each night as a signal for help, hop- 
ing that they might be seen in Tientsin, which is only 
"ibout eight miles away in a straight line. Our provisions 



54 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

were running pretty low, but we found plenty of rice in 
the fort and a garden full of onions and turnips, and 
the boys made some pretty fair stew, some out of canned 
beef and some out of fresh "mule." 

We took the fort on the 226., and stayed there that day 
and the 23d and 24th, and about noon of the 25th a relief 
party oi 2,000 arrived, and we got ready to begin our 
final stretch to Tientsin and comparative security. 

We all crossed the river and camped just opposite the 
Arsenal all night, leaving a party over there to prepare 
the Arsenal for blowing up, which was done just after we 
started at daylight. 

We rnet no opposition on our march from Se-Ku to 
Tientsin, arriving there about 10 o'clock with a heart full 
of unspeakable thankfulness. 

Of course our fighting was by no means over when we 
reached Tientsin, as we had still a month more toi hear 
the bullets sing, but as the object of this is to relate the 
campaign of Admiral Seymour's Column, I will leave the 
rest for some other pen to describe. 



THE SIEGE OF TIENTSIN. 



Chapter V. 

Mr. Gammon, of the A. B. S., kept a detailed rec- 
ord of the Boxer troubles, and is well qualified to speak 
on this subject. We give below extracts of his diary on 
the" siege, which is very interesting: 

"The Empress Dowager's antagonism was shown when 
an edict was issued commanding the Chinese troops not 
to fire on the Boxers. When the society had been vir- 
tually placed under government protection, it became a 
power over the whole of Northern China. Those who be- 
fore had refused to join in the movement, were now com- 
pelled to or else receive the disfavor of the Government 
itself. 

''After this the Boxers gradually worked their way 
toward Tientsin, and during the first week in June, be- 
tween 40,000 and 50,000 of them were stationed around 
the city. 

''During the second week in June the foreign residents 
were expecting to be attacked at any moment, and on the 
15th day of the same month their fears were realized. 
Three churches in the city were burned and also one on 
the outskirts of Tientsin. Many native houses were also 
destroyed. From a commanding position the foreigners 
watched the work of destruction. During the night 



56 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

thousands of red lanterns could be seen flitting about the 
streets. A number of these would collect together and 
then a small light would grow and grow until the sur- 
roundings would be lit up as if by thousands of electric 
lights. Again and again this spectacle was repeated, until 
hundreds of native houses had been redu.ced to ashes. 
The red lanterns were carried by the Boxers to identify 
them from those whose lives they were seeking. 

*'On the 1 6th of June news was received in Tientsin 
that the Taku Forts were to be bombarded by the allied 
fleets, and on the following day the bombardment began. 

*'As soon as the Chinese troops received word that the 
bombardment had begun, they immediately opened fire 
on the city. The telegraph, telephone and railway sys- 
tems had been destroyed, leaving the residents without 
any means of communication with the outside world. 
The shelling of the city continued for twelve days, until 
not a house stood but what had received some damage. 
There were but 700 Russian troops in Tientsin, and it was 
owing to their bravery that the lives of the foreign resi- 
dents were saved. At the railway station 14,000 Chinese 
troops were held at bay by the Russians. Had assist- 
ance not arrived, the foreign residents intended to shoot 
all the women and children, rather than allow them to 
fall into the hands of the Chinese. A number of men 
had even been detailed to perform this horrible task. 

TIENTSIN DEFENSES. 

It was a huge territory to defend, especially with only 
fourteen hundred troops, but many of the street ends were 
barricaded and machine guns placed in the most com- 
manding positions, so that the enemy must suffer heavy 
loss even if successful in an attack, The railway station 



SIEGE Ot- TIEi^TSIN. 57 

was on the opposite side of the river, which is crossed by 
a pontoon bridge, and this important position had to be 
held at any cost, since the possession of it by the Chinese 
would give them the key to the settlement and put an 
end to the possibility of using the Hne for transportation 
purposes. 

On Friday all seemed quiet, but the Boxers gatliered 
with the darkness and, emboldened by the deeds of the 
night before, came in a mass to the railway station, plan- 
ning to cross the pontoon bridge, loot and destroy the 
houses, and massacre the inhabitants. But, as had been 
predicted, they were easily repulsed. The Cossacks, who 
had taken charge of this point of the defense, opened fire 
upon them at close range with a terrific rifle fire and shots 
from the field guns. Poor, deluded men — armed with 
banners and spears, confident of the spiritual protection in 
which they had beert taught tO' believe — they advanced 
boldly to the muzzles of the guns that were mowing 
them down like grass before the scythe, and before they 
were undeceived hundreds lay torn and bleeding on the 
ground. In their retreat they carried away most of their 
dead and wounded, only about a dozen having been left. 

A TERRIBLE NIGHT. 

Friday night was wholly spent on the tower, and it 
was a night long to be remembered. With field glasses 
we could see the Boxers gather outside the city walls, and 
then began a terrible scene of destruction. Again and 
again they would gather round a group of buildings and 
apply their torches, and soon the sky was one red glow 
from the thousands of burning houses and shops in the 
suburbs. Why they should thus destroy the property of 
their own people we could not understand, but it was 



;8 



CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 



probably that they might satisfy their passion for loot 
and murder. All night long we watched this terrible 
work, expecting them tO' turn upon the settlement at any 
moment, but it was not until the first streak of dawn ap- 
peared, at 4 o'clock, that we had serious cause for 
alarm. We were watching the movements of the mob 
and saw them suddenly gather in one mass, wave their 




GORDON HALL^ WHERE THE LADIES AND CHILDREN WERE 
KEPT DURING THE TIENTSIN SIEGE. 

torches high in the air, hesitate for a moment, then witii 
a terrible yell they made a mad rush for rhe settlement. 
They were no longer human beings, they were blood- 
thirsty savages, drunk with the sight of fire and blood. 



MISERIES OF GORDON HALL. 

All this time the forts in the native city were shelling 



v.. 

SIEGE OF TIENTSIN. 59 

US frightfully, with shrapnel and segment, and these were 
exploding everywhere. Of the great mass of people at 
the Gordon Hall I know but little, save that they suffered 
every possible inconvenience. Canned meats were 
brought in from the looted shops by the men, but there 
were no stoves, so that nothing could be cooked, and poor 
little infants had to be fed with cold milk. In hours of 
quiet the ladies slept on chairs, on the platform, on the 
stairs, in the halls, and on the floors of various rooms, 
but during the hours of shelling they were packed in dark 
cellars, where they passed hours of misery. A few were 
hysterical, and one or two nearly died from heart failure, 
but, as a rule, they bore the trouble well. 

With scanty clothing and little bedding, with none of 
the conveniences of home, with an unbroken diet of cold 
canned meats and crackers and with such crowded ac- 
commodations, it is easy to imagine what the ladies suf- 
fered during the many days they were confined there. 

:eFFECT OF SHELL FIRE. 

At Mr. Cousins' we were more pleasantly situated. In 
the godowns were hundreds of bags of rice, so that our 
five hundred refugees were well fed, and the Methodist 
ladies and ourselves had the use of the house and office 
buildings. For the ladies there was a small cellar, about 
10 feet by lo feet, and 6 feet high, around the sides of 
which were piled boxes of soap, offering absolute protec- 
tion. It may seem remarkable that, although the settle- 
ment was bombarded for so many days, only five citizens 
were killed. On the street we were entirely exposed, and 
it is marvellous that "narrow escapes" could go on in- 
definitely, day after day, as they did. 



60 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

A CRITICAL TIME. 

The beginning of the bombardment on Sunday was 
the first fruit of the taking of the Taku forts, and on Mon- 
day night came the second, when General Nieh's troops 
made a determined and long attack on ths railway sta- 
tion, held by the Cossacks, who, as every one must ac- 
knowledge, were our salvation. In the terrific battle 
which followed they lost no less than one hundred killed, 
but the Chinese lost many hundreds. With all their cour- 
age the Cossacks were finally forced to send for aid, and 
were reinforced by the British, with whom they finally 
repulsed the Chinese. It was a critical time, and only a 
dispensation of Providence blinded the eyes of the Chinese 
to the fact that an attack made on two points simultane- 
ously must have been successful. For three days more 
our fate hung in the balance, with all the favor (save the 
all-important favor of God) on the side of the Chinese. 

The Imperial troops numbered at least five thousand 
and we knew that were they to attack from the open plain, 
or get over the river in a body, assisted by the innumera- 
ble Boxers, we could not stand against them. But hap- 
pily they did neither, why, we do not know. They en- 
trenched themselves in a long line across the river and 
poured a perfect rain of bullets into the settlement. So 
thick were they that one might pick up five hundred of 
these little pellets in a space of twenty yards on any 
street. Many people received wounds from these stray 
bullets and in our own party one refugee was killed and 
two were wounded, and Mr. Cousins also' received a 
woimd in the leg. One of the shrapnel burst in the go- 
down, where three hundred refugees were sitting, killing 
one instantly and wounding another. Had this shell 
burst lower down, at least fifty would have been killed. 



SIEGE OF TIENTSIN. 6l 

THE SNIPING, 

But in spite of hundreds of bursting shells and showers 
of stray bullets, our greatest danger came from hidden 
riflemen, who seemed to be in a thousand different build- 
ings in the settlement, especially on the godowns. From 
many points we were repeatedly shot at as we walked 
the streets on duty, and only the fact that these Boxer 
sympathizers were imtrained in the use of arms prevented 
an immense loss of life among us. 

It was trying enough to have shell shrieking and burst- 
ing about us and bullets straying in showers into our 
midst, but to feel that from windows and roofs in every 
part of the settlement we were being repeatedly and in- 
dividually shot at as we walked the streets, was very wear- 
ing. The defense lines were skirmishing all the time, 
and wounded men began to fill the houses set aside as 
hospitals, which gave employment to our ladies, for 
thousands of bandages had to be cut and rolled. 

THE NATIVE CHRISTIANS. 

And here, too, let me record the excellent work done 
by the native Christian refugees undei our charge. Their 
first work was to barricade the whole settlement, especial- 
ly the line of water front, about two miles, which had to 
be held by our men and had to be open to a deadly fire 
from the enemy on the opposite bank. For this purpose 
huge bales of hides, camel's wool, et( ., were used, with 
which the godowns were fortunately stocked, and the 
thousands of bales necessary were carted from the go- 
downs and piled into position by our refugee preachers, 
teachers and helpers, who were unaccustomed to heavy 
labor and who did their work while under fire, freely of- 
fering their services, working day and night until the 



62 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

stupendous task was completed, with blistered hands and 
aching backj. Their efforts saved the lives of many sol- 
diers, besides placing the settlement in a much more se- 
cure position. They carried water, ammunition and pro- 
visions ; they dug graves, performed every kind of heavy 
labor, and more than earned their protection as well as 
unstinted praise. Two of them volunteered to attempt 
passing the enemy's lines to carry news of our serious 
situation to the admirals at Taku, and one got back after 
having been thrown in the river for dead. Even when 
shells passed so close to our heads as to barely graze the 
wall by our side, and when bullets sang all around us, 
these country refugees did not display any unusual alarm, 
but followed our instructions calmly. Men with no re- 
gard for mission work, and who had contempt for the 
Chinese, had to admit that these proved themselves true 
in every particular, and we could not have held out with- 
out them. 

The situation got so bad that Mr. Seeberg and Mr. 
James Watts, volunteered to carry dispatches to the Taku 
fort asking for reinforcements. They got through safe- 
ly and a relief party reached here in time to save us." 



RELIEF OF TIENTSIN AND TAKING OF THE 

NATIVE CITY. 



. Chapter VI. 

From the time the reUef party reached Tientsin, on 
June 23 until July 8 nothing of any great importance oc- 
curred. The Chinese kept up a slow fire from time to 
time and sniping was always the order oi the day. Our 
correspondent, therefore, opens his diary again and we 
will give you his account as he saw and witnessed the 
bombardment and taking of the Native City of Tientsin. 

NARROW ESCAPES. 

On the 8th, 9th and loth the Chinese have given us 
some sharp times of shelling. Their marksmen did so 
well that general admiration would have been expressed 
if only they had been shelling somebody else. 

Many wonderful escapes are related. One old preacher 
of the American Board, who with his family had occu- 
pied a room for some weeks, was persuaded to change 
his quarters. Half an hour after, a shell came into that 
very room and burst into some hundred fragments. A 
mother with her children decided to leave the nursery for 
a while; they had just gone below when the room was 
wrecked. 

CUNNING CHINESE. 

An attempt was made by the Chinese in large force to 
cut our communications again. They were discovered 



64 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

working around by the West Arsenal, and got as far as 
the race course. The Japanese, British and Germans, 
however, were soon in the open against them. By some 
clever manoeuvring they were completely at the mercy of 
our men and were soon in full flight, having lost six guns 
and about 400 killed. The Japanese did splendidly, and 
with their cavalry and field guns cut off not a few. 




THE NATIVE CITY OF TIENTSIN. 

Friday, July 13. 
The secret has for once been kept. The attack by all 
the forces on the native city began this morning. Our 
guns opened fire at 5 A. M. with astounding effect on the 
atmosphere. The Chinese are punishing us back, but as 
their efforts are limited to 40 and 85 millimetres, the de- 
moralization is small compared to that we are inflicting. 



RELIEF OF TIENTSIN. O3 

At 7 A. M. rifle firing began to displace the shell, and the 
South Gate was the objective of our attack, which was 
largely in the hands of the Americans and French. 

July 14. 

When I closed my notes of yesterday I referred to the 
attack on the native city then going on. The allies 
(American, British, French and Japanese) were to make 
a combined attack on the old walled city from the south 
and southwest. This was done, but done incompletely, 
and with very heavy loss. Tientsin emphasizes the les- 
sons of South Africa that modern arms of precision tend 
to equate soldiers unequal in morale ; a Chmaman with a 
gun at two miles, or a rifle at one, is almost as good a man 
as a European, and if his weapons are slightly better, he 
is quite as good a man. The Chinese still wishes to run 
and does run when the risk is great, but as long as the 
gap is big enough to give him a good start in the race for 
safety, he stands up and shoots commendably straight. 

The Russians did their part with success, but for once 
they did not meet the chief piece de resistance. They 
captured eight 60-millimetre Krupp field pieces, and drove 
the Chinese clear away from the Canal and the eastern 
suburbs of the city; they had few casualties. The sole 
friendly criticism one has to oft'er on their attack is that 
they did not keep the other allies infoinied as to their 
movements. 

The Japanese were in the centre to go straight for the 
South Gate (one mile distant) ; the Americans were to be 
on their right, but by some misunderstanding (of doubt- 
ful origin) went to the left, and got themselves landed in 
a pent-house. The British were the extreme left, and the 
French the extreme right. 

A Japanese officer sent a message to General Dorward 



66 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

that he was in the city, 'would the big battery cease fir- 
ing?' This was a mistake, but all the same the battery 
ceased at the very moment it was dealing out death to 
the enemy. The Japanese were not in the city, but near 
it (200 to 500 yards). As the line advanced, all available 
cover was seized, but the Chinese were in great force on 
the old wall and behind loopholes, and a hundred rifles 
answered instantaneous exposure. About 11 A. M. they 
had advanced to within 500 yards of the wall, and then 
found themselves in a fix; they could not gO' on, they 
could not come back. The consequences were that they 
had to rest there all day, under fair cover (a mud vil- 
lage), in a heat of from 96° to 100° Fahrenheit. Des- 
perate efforts were made to bring off the wounded, of 
whom there were over 500. Blood here showed itself 
thicker than water. The British lost twenty-five men in 
bringing oft the American wounded and in taking up am- 
munition, of which all arms ran out. The French were 
very tenacious and lost 10 per cent., 140 out of 1,400 
men. 

The history of the rest of the day was the arrival of 
wounded, and the taking out of supplies ; the troops re- 
mained under cover. We had a quiet night, though at 
6 P. M. the Shui-sze-ying sent a few hissing brutes into 
the French concession, and three at our battery. The lat- 
ter instantly took up the challenge and promptly enforced 
silence. 

The allies all got intO' the city early in the morning, 
with little opposition, four Japanese wounded on the way 
in, and the Japanese, French and American flags were 
clearly seen from the settlement on the walls and high 
buildings. 

The capture of the city must have been unexpected. 




I. THE EMPEROR KVVANG-Hsu (frofu an old photograph). 

2. THE EMPRESS. 3 AND 4. LI-HUNG-CHANG AND 
PRINCE CHING^ THE PEACE ENVOYS. 5. "'bOXERS" 
BEFORE the; COURT TO RECEIVE THEIR VERDICT. 



68 ~ CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

for large quantities of sycee were found lying exposed in 
many of the houses and Jiongs (business houses). Valu- 
able silks, articles of clothing, curios, etc., were brought 
away in large quantities. 

The wounded numbered 600, /. c, the casualties were 
about 10 per cent. The walled city is held by four par- 
ties of the troops, numbering well over one thousand. 
The heat was appalling all the time, ranging from 96° to 
100°, and often topping the century. In proportion to 
their number the American troops seem to have suffered 
most, for out of about 900 men engaged, their casualties 
amounted to over a hundred, among them brave Colonel 
Liscumb, who had only arrived from Manila the day 
before. Their hospital, packed upstairs and down, was 
a terrible sight on the morning of the next day. 

The question at that time was loot ; in one case a raid- 
ing syndicate of men had a superb spoil of gold bars and 
watches. 

Sycee (silver) which w^as throw^n down by fugitives in 
their haste to quit the doomed place could be picked up 
all round, and terror struck natives who remain on the 
scene never show themselves out on the street. It will be 
years before Tientsin can rebuild and regain her old posi- 
tion, 



BOMBARDMENT OF THE TAKU FORTS. 



Chapter VII. 

An officer of the S. S. Hsingfung, who has arrived, 
gave us an interesting account of the bombardment O'f the 
forts; he said : 

"We were right in the thick of the fight, the shot and 
shell just clearing our awning boom. 

There were no big ships in the action, only gunboats or 
small craft, comprising three Russian, one English, one 
French and one German. 



THI5 DAMAGE TO THE VESSELS. 

One of the Russians got a shot in her bow and went 
aground in shallow water. She was hit five times in all, 
and another of the Russians was hit three times. The 
Algerine, the British vessel, sustained no serious damage 
and took only two shots through her stokehold ventilators. 
The heavy loss of the Russians is accounted for by the 
fact that a shot or shell fell in the magazine, causing an 
explosion of ammunition. 

AN ULTIMATUM SENT. 

An ultimatum had been sent ashore to the effect that 
if the Boxers were not checked other steps would have 
to be taken. Then some of the naval officers went tO' see 



70 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

the commander at 12 o'clock on Saturday night, to ask 
what he intended doing. The general replied that 

HE MEANT TO FIGHT, 

and a bombardment by the fleet was arranged for at 2 
o'clock that morning. The Chinese, however, began fir- 
ing a little before i a. m., using the searchlight. The U. 
S. S. Monocacy had been up river on patrol work, and as 
she came down men on shore near the wharves opened 
fire on her w^ith rifles, but they were soon silenced. 

The Russian vessel that was hit five times had four 
holes alone in one side, three of them being very near her 
water line. 

THE ILTIS LATE AT THE FIGHT. 

The German cruiser litis came down the river from 
Tang-ku an hour after the firing began, when she opened 
and was followed twenty minutes later by the French 
gunboat Lion. 

On Monday the Japanese were busy "sniping" all Chi- 
nese in the vicinity of the forts. A Russian torpedo boat 
went up the river and the people in one of the villages 
opened fire on her with rifles. She replied with her ma- 
chine guns and soon cleared the place out. 

BRITISH USE enemy's GUNS. 

After taking the North fort, the British turned their 
guns on the other fort. At daylight the British were 
ashore with their rifles, picking off the Chinese gunners 
from a low wall outside the moat and then, with the Japa- 
nese, they rushed in over the bridge across the moat and 
took the place. The ships then steamed down opposite 
South fort, and it was here the litis sustained her losses. 



BOMBARDMENT OF THE TAKU FORTS. 71 

Besides the litis and the Algerine, there were engaged 
here the two Russians and the Frenchman. 

The Algerine ceased fire for a time just before daylight 
and the lookers on feared she was out of action. With 
the dawn, however, she was soon as busy as ever, her 
crew making fine practice. The last shot was fired at 
6 45 A. M., according to the Poo-chi's time. 

Very few guns in the fort appeared to be seriously 
damaged. The weapons used were all the late-pattern 
guns, the heavy muzzle-loaders being found with their 
tompions still in their throats. 

The fighting united forces were represented by three 
Russian ships, one Japanese, one German (the litis) and 
one English (the Algerine). The latter was directly un- 
der the forts and did magnificent work and markmanship, 
and escaped with slight damage. The litis fared worse ; 
a lieutenant was blown to pieces and the commander was 
wounded, but the greater punishment was meted out to a 
Russian gunboat, which received a shell in the boiler 
room, and many were killed. She drifted ashore, disabled 
in one sense, but not in another, for she poured an ex- 
tremely hot fire into the forts and finally succeeded in 
blowing up the magazine. 

The concussion was terrific and will be ever memora- 
ble to those that heard it. The Chinese fought with great 
pluck and pertinacity, and for six hours there was no re- 
laxation of the furore. The Japanese landed a force and 
attacked the enemy at the point of the bayonet, and finally 
took the forts with a gallant charge. The pity is their 
captain lost his life leading the troops. 

The forces of the other countries followed the Japa- 
nese, and thus the Northern and the Western forts 
were occupied by the Japanese, the Right and the Left 



y2 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

forts by the other forces. At 7 A. M. the fight was over, 
when the British took charge of the Western fort, and 
the Japanese left the forts to guard the station. The 
railway track going to Tientsin did not appear to have 
been wrecked, but as the locomotive had been damaged, 
the crew of the Atago were told ofif to repair it. 

A SCENE OF CARNAGE 

The forts do not show much damage from the outside, 
but on entering them a very vivid idea is gained as to the 
effect of modern shell fire. The place was wrecked, and 
mutilated men and horses were thickly strewn over the 
blood-stained ground. 

A number of foreign houses ashore suffered severely, 
Mr. Limberg's being entirely destroyed. One shell went 
right through one of the Tang-ku hotels. The shell that 
smashed Mr. Limberg's house also killed three Chinese. 
Everything soon quieted down and the dift'erent flags are 
now flying from the forts." 



MURDER OF THE JAPANESE SECRETARY AND 
GERMAN MINISTER. 



Chapter VIII. 

On June nth occurred the murder of the Japanese 
Chancellor, Sugiyama, by the Boxers, and Tung Fu- 
hsiang's Kansu troops. The Chancellor attempted to 
leave Peking by the Yung-tmg gate in order to meet Ad- 
miral Seymour's relief force, which was on its way to the 
capital from Tientsin, and which was apparently expected 
to reach Peking that day. Sugiyama rode in a cart with 
a broad red band round the body, denoting that the oc- 
cupant was of, at least, the second rank. When he ar- 
rived at the Yung-ting gate he was accosted by a number 
of Tung Fu-hsiang's men who were guarding it. It 
seemed that Prince Tuan had that day given secret orders 
that no foreigner was to be allowed either to leave the city 
or enter it. He was therefore stopped and asked wlio' he 
was. Sugiyama told them that he was a member of the 
Japanese legation. ''Are you the Japanese minister?" 
"No, I am only a chancellor of the legation." "Then 
what right have you, a petty officer like that, to ride in 
such a high official's cart?" So they pulled him out of 
his cart and began to mob the unlucky Chancellor. Sugi- 
yama then demanded to be brought before General Tung 




THE IMPRESS DOWAGER. 

{From a recent photograph.) 



MURDER OF THE GERMAN MINISTER. 75 

Fu-hsiang. "What! You to speak to our Great Gen- 
eral! (Ta Shuei.) Why, you are too insignificant to 
have such an honor!" At last, however, a red-buttoned 
Kansu officer appeared on the scene, to whom Sugiyama 
appealed for help. Instead of doing so the ruffian merely 
ordered the Japanese Chancellor's head to be struck off as 
a sacrifice to their war banner, and stuck near the gate, 
"for trying to break out of Peking." Sugiyama was the 
first foreigner murdered inside Peking. 

The great mass of the population of Peking were great- 
ly alarmed at these blood-thirsty proceedings, and all 
were expecting that the Empress Dowager would show 
some disapproval of the murder of the Japanese Chan- 
cellor, belonging to a friendly State, and the member of 
an Embassy; but the Manchus, one and all, were jubilant 
when they heard of the murder. Finally the official seal 
of approval from the highest quarter for this dastardly 
murder was made by Prince Tuan, who, when he met 
General Tung Fu-hsiang the next morning, slapped the 
latter on the back and raising his right thumb called out 
"Hao" (good!) The raising of the thumb denotes that 
the person addressed is a "first-class hero." 

We should here mention that during the whole of the 
time whilst the Chinese party were arguing with the 
Manchus in this to be ever notable Grand Council, His 
Majesty the Emperor maintained a moody and even tear- 
ful silence ; and what could he do ? Bereft of power and 
influence, despised of the Manchus, silence was doubtless 
his only way of showing passive dissent of his Manchu 
nobles' and ministers* policy. But when at last it ap- 
peared to His Majesty that the warlike policy of his coun- 
trymen was about to prevail. His Majesty could no longer 
contain himself, and turned impulsively to the Empress 



y6 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

Dowager, who sat a foot or so in front on his left, and 
begged her to reconsider her decision to fight all foreign 
nations, saying that the movement once inaugurated by 
the Government would make peace an impossibility in the 
future and destruction of the country imminent. His 
Majesty was going on to say something more, but seemed 
to pull himself suddenly up, for, instead of listening to 
His Majesty, as court etiquette required, the Empress 
Dowager openly affronted the Emperor by ignoring his 
*words and turning her back on His Majesty. This was 
the last stroke on the Chinese party, whose words were 
simply drowned in the uproar of the Manchus, who 
unanimously shouted for war to the knife, and who looked 
with deep hate on their Chinese colleagues, whom they 
now considered as enemies and traitors to their cause. 

At this time the German Minister decided he would 
visit the Tsung-li Yamen. The ministers of the Yamen 
were dumfounded when they received the note and wrote 
back begging him to forego his visit until afifairs became 
more settled, as the crisis at the moment was in a most 
dangerous pitch and the streets and alleys in the vicinity 
of the legations were crowded with wild and savage 
troops over whom the Tsung-li Yamen had not the least 
control, but the German Minister determined to visit the 
Yamen, and was accordingly murdered en route by the 
Kansu troops and some of Yung Lu's Manchu troops of 
the Wu-wei Corps. This occurred on the 20th of June. 
After this, pandemonium broke loose and all Peking 
seemed to be in confusion. Panic reigned everywhere 
amongst the most law-abiding of the Chinese inhabitants. 

Th€ murder of the German Minister opened the eyes of 
the Imperial Court. They saw that things were now in 
danger of being beyond recall and the more reckless 



MURDER OF TliE GERMAN MINISTER. 



77 



joined Prince Tuan and Kang Yi in pressing the Em- 
press Dowager to declare war and bring inside Peking 
all Yung Lu's troops, who were armed with modern fire- 
arms, machine and field guns, as from what had been ex- 
perienced before by the Boxers and Kansu men in their 
attacks on the legations, swords, spears and rifles were 




BARON VON KETTELER. 



useless to destroy the foreign quarters. The most promi- 
nent and active of the Manchu party presented themselves 
at the Palace, therefore, on the 20th of June, the day of 
the murder, and got the Empress Dowager to issue a de- 
cree to Yung Lu, as Generalissimo of the Grand Army of 
the North, commanding him to bring in his army into 



78 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

Peking and formally attack the legations, destroy them, 
and then leave for Tientsin, to destroy the foreigners 
there and so on until all were driven into the sea. 

The late German Minister, who was murdered by the 
Chinese on the 20th of June, was comparatively a young 
man. Baron Clemens August von Kettler was born at 
Potsdam on the 226. of November. He entered the Diplo- 
matic Service and passed a special examination for Chi- 
nese. In the eighties he was appointed interpreter to the 
German consulate at Canton. During the Chinese ris- 
ing in 1888, when the Foreign settlement at Canton was 
attacked. Baron von Ketteler distinguished himself by the 
energy with which, with the assistance of a few German 
residents, he defended a house in which the women and 
children had sought refuge. It was largely due to him 
that the rioters were expelled from the settlement. His 
services on this occasion were recognized by the Emperor 
William L, who conferred on him the fourth class of the 
Red Eagle Order. After filling various other posts in 
the diplomatic service, Baron von Ketteler was appointed 
German Minister to Mexico in 1896. Last year, on the 
retirement of Baron von Heyking, who had successfully 
carried through the Kiao-Cheo negotiations, Baron von 
Ketteler was appointed to succeed him. He was very 
popular in European society in Peking, and, owing to his 
intimate knowledge of Chinese, frequently represented 
the legations in confidential communications with the 
Tsung-li Yamen. It was on such a mission as this that 
he was engaged when he met his death. Baron von Ket- 
teler married Miss Maud Ledyard, an American lady, at 
Detroit, in 1897. 



THE SIEGE OF PEKING. 



Chapter IX. 

Next to the particulars of the fall of Peking, the in- 
formation most eagerly sought after, just now, by the 
reading public is probably the story of the gallant defense 
in which a handful of foreigners, as compared with the 
surrounding myriads of the Chinese, so bravely with- 
stood a siege of nine long, dreary and desperate weeks in 
the midst of privations and ill-suppressed despair and 
were finally rescued, as if brought back from death to life. 
It will, therefore, be with much interest that a diary of 
Peking during the siege from the pen of Rev. Gilbert 
Reid, D. D., taken from the "Shanghai Mercury," will be 
read. 

PEKING ALARMED. 

''The tide of fury which swept up higher and higher 
to the capital from the Boxers' movement alarmed us all 
by June 8th. The American missionaries consulted and 
decided to concentrate at the large and suitable quarters 
of the American Methodist Mission. 

The concentration of the missionaries at one place 
meant the desertion of all their houses and work. The 
converts of the London Mission not being granted en- 
trance to the British Legation, also went to the same ren- 



8o CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

dezvous, and two or three of the English missionaries 
were there to help. There were sixty-six men, women 
and children, and over 600 natives. Twenty of the 
American guards were sent over to give protection to 
them. 

The Catholics were mostly gathered at the North 
Cathedral. Refugees came in from the city and country, 
until there were nearly 2,000 of them. There were there 
also a dozen fathers, including Mgr. Favier, and about 
the same number of sisters. Thirty of the French guards 
and ten of the Italians were sent to protect them. 

THE WORK OF DESTRUCTION. 

The desertion of so much property instigated the Box- 
ers to attack, but there was no other course open, so long 
as the officials and the throne seemed indisposed to sup- 
press the growing disturbance. 

WAR DECLARED. 

On June 19th the Tsung-li-Yamen handed passports to 
all the foreign ministers, and gave them one day's limit 
to leave Peking. By an edict of June 20th China de- 
clared war. Here then was the beginning of the trouble 
for us. 

THE MURDER OF BARON VON KETTELER. 

Baron von Ketteler, the German Minister, had written 
the night before to the Yamen, asking for audience with 
the two princes, Ching and Tuan, at 8 o'clock the next 
morning, and saying he would call at that hour. The 
Minister, with his secretary, M. Cordes, proceeded at the 
time mentioned in their sedan chairs on a mission of real 
friendliness, to try to warn China of the peril of the 






w 



5 




82 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

policy which had been entered upon, and at least secure 
proper escort. They left their German guard behind to 
excite no needless animosity. On their way up the main 
street, perhaps twenty minutes from their legation, a mili- 
tary officer, with button and feather on his hat, raised his 
rifle and aimed directly at the Minister, killing him in- 
stantly. The secretary was just rising from his seat, 
when he was shot, but not fatally. He managed to get 
out of his chair and without further accident, but bleed- 
ing profusely, wended his way, in a roundabout course, 
to the American Mission. 

As soon as he saw a foreigner, he fainted away. Ger- 
man guards came to carry him to his legation. The news 
went quickly from one to the other. The thought of at- 
tempting a journey to Tientsin was then given up. 

PREPARATIONS FOR THE SIEGE. 

The missionaries were ordered to proceed to their re- 
spective legations, and also immediately to the British le- 
gation, as the international rendezvous. Only a few 
things could be taken, such as personal servants could 
carry. 

THE FATE OF REV. HUBERTY JAMES. 

The one who had made -the arrangements for the 
Catholics, and who was much respected by the Prince, 
was Rev. Francis Huberty James. About 4 o'clock in 
the afternoon, Mr. James was passing along the north 
side of the palace on his way to the British legation. We 
saw him motioning with his hand ; a shot was heard, and 
he disappeared. Our only conjecture is that he was 
killed. The murder of these two eminent Europeans on 
the same day was China's seal to her declaration of war ! 



SIKGE OF PEKING. 83 

IN THE BRITISH LEGATION. 

All the non-combatants were directed to establish them- 
selves at the British legation, which had been decided ^ 
upon as final defense in case the other legations would 
have to be forsaken. All through the afternoon of the 
20th, the foreign community came passing into the lega- 
tion, each building being set apart for the use of some 
one nationality or company. The siege had begun. No 
one knew the outcome. 

The American missionaries were all tumbled down in 
the chapel, with no food, kitchen or beds, except the bed- 
ding brought with them. While no preparation had been 
made for a siege or defense, things, however, got into 
shape in a most remarkable manner. 

THE LINE OF DEFENSE 

Was about i,ooo yards east and west, from the Russian 
and American legations at the west to the Italian legation 
at the east, and some 600 yards north and south from the 
Austrian legation at northeast and British legation at the 
northwest to the city wall at the south. Between were 
the French, German, Japanese and Spanish legations, the 
quarters of the Customs, the Hotel of Peking, the Club, 
Kierulff's store, Imbeck's store. Hong Kong Bank, house 
of Peking Syndicate, the palace of Prince Su, and several 
native houses and shops. 

The Germans and Americans also occupied positions on 
the wall. This was the parallelogram of international de- 
fense. 

At the British legation were over 400 foreigners (not 
including the marines) and over 350 Chinese, men, 
women and children. About 2,300 Chinese were congre- 



84 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

gated at the palace of Prince Su, all of which was turned 
over to their use tlie second day of the siege. 

The guns were Colt's automatic with the Americans, 
the Nordenfeldt with the British, a Maxim gun with the 
Austrians, and a one-pounder with the Italians. On July 
7th we utilized what was termed the International Gun. 
Some gave it the name of 'Betsy.' It was an old English 
gun of '60 found that day in a Chinese shopi by a China- 
man. The shells fitted to this gun were Russian, the Rus- 
sians having brought shells but no gun. She was placed 
on an Italian carriage and had an American gunner. 

THE FORTIFICATIONS. 

Hardly had the cosmopolitan company assembled at 
the British legation, when not only the food supply be- 
came an important question, but the whole matter of for- 
tification was seen to have been left almost neglected. 

Less had been done than at the American Methodist 
Mission, and yet there was the possibility of needing the 
legations as a place of defense. Rev. Mr. Gamewell, of 
that mission, who had shown skill in making fortifica- 
tions, was chosen by Sir Claude Macdonald as chief of 
fortifications. Day after day, and many nights, he toiled, 
until at the end we began to feel ourselves quite secure. 

The rifle firing was mostly at night, but the injury in- 
flicted was greater in the day There were some sharp- 
shooters, showing that under proper drill the Chinese 
could make good soldiers. Many of those wounded were 
from stray shots or from carelessness. At night the main 
thing for our men to do was to lie low and save their 
ammunition. 

THE BIG GUN PRACTICE. 

Firing from guns began on June 23d, and became real 



SIE:GE of PEKING. 85 

cannonading by the 28th. There was a large three-inch 
gun at the gate to the west of the American position ; an- 
other at the gate to the east of the German position; a 
large Krupp gun north of Prince Su's palace and French 
legation ; a smaller gun for a few days west of the British 
legation, and probably three guns in the Imperial City 
north of the British legation. In proportion to the num- 
ber of shells or cannon balls fired the harm done was very 
slight. From July 5th to July 13th the number of shots 
fired, as actually counted, was 2,614. The total number 
could not have been less than 4,000. Bombshell shelters 
were prepared in the British legation, but never used. 

FAILURES OF SORTIES. 

Our sorties all proved worse than failures. The first, 
on June 24th, under Captain Flalliday, was made from 
the British legation to capture the gun which fired from 
the west. The gun was not reached, and Captain Halli- 
day was so severely wounded that until the troops came 
he was unfit for service. 

The second sortie was made on July ist to- capture the 
large gun to the north. There were two routes taken 
from the grounds of Prince Su. One route was taken by 
a few Italians and British under the ItaHan commander. 
Lieutenant Paolini. The second was taken by the Japa- 
nese under Captain Ando. The former course proved a 
bad one, leading right up against a Chinese barricade. 
At once the trap was sprung. Two Italian marines were 
killed, the Italian commander, two British marines, and 
a student of the British legation, Mr. W. C. Townsend, 
were wounded. In the Japanese party one was killed. 

A third sortie to capture the same gun was made on 
July 6th by the Japanese under Captain Ando. The gun 



86 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

was not captured, but just when it was reached Captain 
Ando was killed, and two Japanese were wounded. 

THE EMPRESS AND THE BOXERS. 

The guns and most of the rifles were fired by Chinese 
soldiers, as the regimentals proved to us when they were 
captured; still, as the edicts early in the war show, the 
aid of the Boxers was called in by the throne. On June 
the 24th the edict was issued appointing Prince Chuang, 
one of the heriditary princes Jike Prince Su, in supreme 
command of the Boxers. 

On the following day recognition was continued by 
the Empress Dowager giving 100,000 taels, not only to 
the two divisions of Manchu troops, but to the Boxers. 
She exhorted the Imperial nobles not to be behind the 
Boxers in courage and loyalty. Then and afterward the 
Christian adherents were condemned, warned or insulted. 

A GERMAN DISASTER. 

On June 30th and July ist came a serious encounter 
with the Chinese on the part of the Germans. On the 
former day the Chinese placed a gun east of the German 
position on the wall, and began to put up a new barricade 
nearer the Germans. The Germans, with a weak barri- 
cade and only rifles, but with plenty of pluck, began to 
fire. The Chinese from a sheltered position answered 
hotly. The result was a bad one for the Germans, the 
worst of the whole siege. Two were killed instantly ; 
two were wounded, who soon died ; and four others were 
wounded, but recovered. The same day three others 
were wounded, and one died from wounds. 

AN UNFORTUNATE RETREAT 

Early on the ist of July the Germans retired from their 
position on the city wall to their legation. The Ameri- 



SIE:GE of PEKING. ^7 

cans, further to the west, saw their German comrades 
rushing down the ramp, and Captain Hall, realizing that 
his men would now be exposed to fire from both east and 
west, and in fact were already being shelled, gave orders 
to his men to retire to their legation from the other ramp. 
The Minister and secretary, both participants in the Civil 
War, saw clearly that this retreat would endanger their 
legation, and that, if the guns should be placed nearer 
they would endanger the general defense at the British 
legation. The British Minister and Captain Myers were 
consulted, and the order was given to return to the wall 
and hold it at all hazards. All of us were willing to as- 
sist, and so spent the Sunday morning in making sand 
bags, filling them and transferring them to the American 
legation. The Chinese were also busy in barricading, 
and having a larger number of men could accomplish 
more. 

They began a new barricade thirty yards west and ex- 
tended it crosswise into a bastion almost up to the Ameri- 
can barricade. The two were so near that bricks were 
throAvn by the Chinese upon the Americans. A plan was 
formed to make an assault upon the Chinese that night. 
The aid of British and Russians was given, and about 
2 o'clock on the morning of the 3d of July, the advance 
was made. Captain Meyers led the British and Ameri- 
cans by the south end to the bastion and inside the bar- 
ricade of the Chinese. As he passed through he struck 
his hg against a spear, which inflicted a painful wound. 
The Chinese were taken by surprise and fled clear down 
to their second barricade. Two of the American marines 
were killed. The Russians took the direct course along 
the north edge of the wall up to the Chinese barricade, 
which they afterward held. One Russian was wounded. 



88 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

By the combined attack some forty of the Chinese were 
killed and some rifles and ammunition captured. New 
and very strong barricades were built, making the posi- 
tion almost impregnable. 

The French and Austrians at the French legation had 
a dangerous position to hold. Shell fire, rifle shots and 
mine explosions, all fell to their lot. On the I2th of July 
the Chinese were discovered making a mine into the lega- 
tion from the east. 

A DETERMINED ATTACK. 

The 13th of July was the day of a most severe assault, 
and the only real forward move from the Chinese. About 
dusk the mine, which had been dug, exploded, burying 
three in the ruins, one of whom was Dr. von Rosthorn, 
Charge d'Afifaires for Austria. 

In a few minutes a second explosion came, which blew 
Dr. von Rosthorn out of the ruins, he having only a slight 
bruise. Several of the Chinese were also buried in the 
ruins. The explosion destroyed part of two buildings. 
Fires were started which destroyed the Minister's main 
building. The Chinese at the same time kept up a heavy 
firing. The French and Austrians, though forced to give 
up over half of the legation and occupy only the western 
part, maintained a steady fire. Besides the two buried in 
the ruins, one French marine was killed, the French com- 
mander. Lieutenant Darcy, two French marines and one 
Austrian were wounded. The Chinese are reported to 
have lost over 200. 

SPLENDID DEFENSE. 

There must have been an unusually large number 
making this attack. The bugles blew, and the turmoil 
kept up for nearly two hours. All the eastern line of de- 



SIE:GE of PEKING. 



89 



fense was under tremendous fire, but considering the 
numbers, our men made a gallant fight and splendid re- 
sistance, enough to prevent a similar attempt. While 
our combined forces had to give up a position on the wall 
at the German legation, a position in the French legation 
and the grounds of Prince Su, we advanced by occupying 
a stronger and larger position on the wall at the Ameri- 
can legation, a position in the Hanlin, and latterly a Mon- 
gol market west of the British legation, where the Chi- 
nese at the beginning had done their heaviest firing. 
The rifle firing, though slack in the day time, had its se- 
rious effect. Our own men, after the first few days, sel- 
dom shot except to hit. The Chinese sometimes aimed, 
but more often fired into walls or space. Some of our 
number were hit in the British legation from shots fired 
in the palace of Prince Su, and others were hit in the 
American legation from shots on the city wall. We give 
below a list of the casualties during the siege : 

CASUALTIES. 



Killed or 

No. of died of wounds. 

Legations— Off. Men. Off. Men. 

American 3 53 . . 7 

Austrian 5 30 i 8 

British 3 79 i 2 

French 3 45 2 9 

German i 50 . . 12 

Japanese ..... i 24 . . 5 

Italian i 23 . . 7 

Russian 2 79 . . 4 

Totals 19 383 4 44 



Wounded. 


Volunteers. 


Off. Men. 


K'ed.W 


'ed. 


2 8 


. . 


I 


3 8 


. . 




2 18 


3 


6 


•• 37 


2 


6 


•• 15 


I 


I 


. . 21 


5 


8 


I II 




. . 


I 18 


I 


I 



9 136 



12 23 



90 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

TEi-T^ANG (Roman Catholic Mission). 

French i 60 i 4 . . 8 

ItaHan iii .. 6 i 3 

Totals 2 71 I 10 I II 

Total killed, 6'] \ wounded, 167. 

We had less than 600, which gradually diminished 
to 400, defended one wide circuit against a foe which at 
one time must have been as many as 10,000. The foe 
for nearly a month kept up a severe attack in one form or 
another, and had no compunctions because innocent 
women and c hildren, high representatives of foreign 
powers, or old friends in the pay of the Chinese Govern- 
ment, were the objects of their wrath. It was all done, 
too, with the consent of the Chinese Government 

the: commissariat. 

Besides the mihtary part of the siege, including the 
work of fortifications, a serious problem was that of 
providing a supply of food not only for nearly 1,000 for- 
eigners, but for over 2,500 Chinese. Little thought had 
been given this subject before we were suddenly in the 
midst of a forced imprisonment. The members of the 
British legation staff had, of course, a supply of canned 
goods, but each group had to form plans for itself, which 
resulted in greater comfort for some than for others. The 
purchase of vegetables was no longer possible. As to 
meat, there were a few sheep, sufficient for the sick, 
wounded and the favored only a few weeks. There were, 
fortunately, a good number of horses and mules in the 
legation or brought in the first day. Thus our meat sup- 
ply kept up until the end. As to flour, there were only a 



SIE:GE of PEKING. 93 

few bags of wliite flour for the whole company. Fortu- 
nately, again, there were native shops within our line of 
defense, and therein was an abundant store of rice, coarse 
wheat and still coarser grain. A mill was started and 
kept a-going grinding flour, which was both nutritious 
and really palatable. A public bakery was also started. 
Coffee, tea and sugar lasted, and butter for occasional 
use. 

SAD POSITION OF THE CHILDREN. 

The main anxiety was concerning the little children. 
It was difficult to keep a supply of condensed milk, for 
the grown-up were disinclined at the outset to forego its 
use. In various ways the children were cared for. There 
were several cases of sickness among them. The only 
deaths from sickness w^ere of children. There were five 
of these little ones called away to their happier home, one 
child of J\Irs. Kruger, two of ]\Irs. Imbeck, one of Mrs. 
Inglis and one of Mrs. Book. The sickness among the 
Chinese, and especially the children, was much greater, 
owing to poorer food and accommodations. 

On August loth a secret message arrived from Gen- 
eral Fukushima, after communication had been inter- 
rupted with the reinforcements for a few days. It was 
dated Mang-tsi-tsun, August 8th, 8:20 A. M., and stated 
that the reinforcements had already arrived there, and, 
unless there occurred some unforeseen event, Peking 
would be reached either on the 13th or 14th. This trust- 
worthy information visibly encouraged the besieged 
people. 

After the message reporting the approach of the relief 
troops was received all the people were craning their 
pecks, expecting their arrival, though their coming had 



94 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

been almost despaired of and the reinforcements were 
seldom spoken of. 

The French Minister had heard from a coolie that 
there had been a severe engagement at Chang-chia-wang 
August nth, and i,ooo Chinese had been killed and 
wounded. According to General Fukushima's message, 
the allies were to arrive in Peking to-morrow or the day 
after to-morrow, and we expected every moment to hear 
the sound of cannonading, but we listened in vain. No 
one came from the Tsung-Li Yamen, in spite of the 
promise that some one would come. We expected that 
the enemy would make a last desperate attack on us when 
the allies approached Peking. 

As was expected, rifle firing was commenced at 5 P. ]\I.. 
and it was briskly kept up till dawn the following morn- 
ing. The British legation suffered the brunt of the at- 
tack. This was the hardest fighting we had since the 
conclusion of the armistice. 

On August 13th the Tsung-Li Yamen notified the for- 
eign Ministers that Prince Tuan and other Ministers 
vs^ould come to the British legation at 11 A. M., for the 
purpose of carrying on peace negotiations. The promise 
was not fulfilled. A message was sent instead, in which 
it was said that China desired the restoration of peace, 
but the foreign soldiers having unreasonably fired on the 
Chinese, had killed twenty-six of them. The foreign 
Ministers, the message added, evidently did not wish the 
restoration of peace, and it was necessary for the Chinese 
officials to come to negotiate peace. About 11 A. M. the 
sound of cannonading was heard toward the southeast, 
apparently heralding the approach of the relief columns ; 
at 10 P. M. the enemy commenced a severe attack, which, 
unlike former occasions, was very determined. 



SIEGE OF PEKING. 95 

August 14th was the day on which the alHes were to 
arrive in Peking. All were expecting the sound of the 
bombardment. At 2 A. M. the sound of field and gatling 
guns was heard in the direction between the Tung-pien 
and the Tse-hwa gates. The delight of all may well be 
imagined. The bombardment grew fiercer. A report was 
brought that 200 foreign troops had entered Peking early 
this morning. The reinforcements which we had been 
avraiting for sixty long days arrived at last. The dark- 
complexioned and yellow-clad Indian troops were the 
first to arrive at the foreign legations. 



THE SONG OF THE SIEGE. 

By the Rev. C. H. Fern, to the American air, "Tramp, 
tramp, tramp, the boys are marching" : 

In the city of Peking, with its ancient walls of brick, 
And its streets for mud and filth afar renowned, 

We have been besieged for weeks by a beastly Chinese trick, 
And the buildings all around us burned to ground. 

CHORUS. 
Tramp, tramp, tramp, the troops are marching, 

Cheer up, comrades, they will come. 
And beneath our various flags we shall breathe fresh air 
again, 
In the Freeland of our own beloved home. 

Here are diplomats galore, representing foreign Powers, 

And they cause the Tsung-Li Yamen anxious care; 
They will neither march straight home, nor reside mid fruit 
and flowers 
At the Yamen, though they've been invited there. 
Chorus. 

From all nations have we come on a peaceful mission bent, 
Be it preaching, Customs, banking, or what not. 

China wanted not our help, so she stupidly has sent 
For the Boxers to exterminate the lot. 
Chorus. 



g6 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

They have poured in shot and shell, with an aim so far from 
true, 
That most of us still live to tell the tale; 
Six-pound shot and shrapnel fierce, walls and barracks have 
passed through, 
Yet in every wild attack they always fail. 
Chorus. 

We've 400 brave marines, who have borne fatigue and pain, 
And have seen some scores of captives fall in death, 

And we feel it certain sure that no enemy can gain 
Our strong fortress while these men have vital breath. 
Chorus. 

We have rice and corn and wdieat, store of grain for weeks to 
come. 
Pony-steak and stew we find not bad to eat; 
Why need we at all to count on Imperial favor's crumb. 
Be it water melons, squashes or fresh meat? 
Chorus. 

We've a cannon old and tried, from a tin-shop saved by chance, 

Which we fire on the enemy with glee. 
When they first did hear it roar, how it made them hop and 
dance. 
For our Betsy is a w-onder for to see. 
Chorus. 

We've been kept in best of cheer by the faithful ladies fair, 
Who have worked with might and main to help the men; 

Of the wounded and the sick they have taken best of care. 
And have made a million sandbags, lacking ten. 
Chorus. 

News from Tientsin cheers our hearts that our troops are on 
the way, 
Three and thirty thousand men of valor tried; 
So in joyful hope we wait, sure that they will bring the day 
Of relief to us and death to Chinese pride. 
Chorus. 



THE RELIEF OF PEKING. 



Chapter X. 

A full account of the taking of Peking is given by the 
"Nagasaki Press," from which we take the following 
salient points : 

The allied forces left Tientsin on August 3d, and did 
not meet with any great opposition until they reached Pei- 
tsang and Yang-tsun. At these places serious engage- 
ments took place, but the enemy was soon routed in both 
places. From Yang-tsun on to Tung-Chow there was 
no organized effort on the part of the enemy to stop us. 

The Twenty-first Brigade, with headquarters, moved 
out of Tung-Chow at 3 130 A. M., the Forty-second Regi- 
ment forming the main bod) . These troops moved rap- 
idly to a position 1,200 metres from the Tsi-hwa Gate. 
The Twenty-first Regiment, nowever, bore off to the 
right, taking the Tung-chih Gate for an objective point. 

Outside the 1 se-hwa Gate there is a stone bridge, and 
this was reached by the Forty-first Regiment at 6:10 
A. M. The cavalry scouts reported that the enemy were 
ranged on the wall in fighting order. The artillery of the 
Forty-first Regiment, therefore, came into action on one 
wing, and the infantry advanced under cover of its fire. 
The enemy opened a severe fire from the wall, and the 
Japanese troops pushed on gradually, finding cover in the 



98 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

houses on either side of the road. On approaching the 
gate, they found the walls and towers intact, and so high 
that to scale them was quite out of the question. Yaz-ki, 
with a detachment of the First Company, and Captain 
Minamiyama, with the Tenth Company, attempted to 
force the gate, but failed. Major Saiki then led the fore- 
most battalion to the gate, for the purpose of blowing it 
up with gun-cotton, but the enemy's fire was so heavy 
that it was found impossible to effect this purpose. 

The casualties at this stage were very heavy. The ar- 
tillery now received orders from Lieutenant General Ya- 
maguchi to fire at the enemy crowding the wall. The ar- 
tillery's position was on an elevated spot about 1,500 or 
1,600 metres from the Tse-hwa Gate, under the com- 
mand of Colonel Nagata. It commenced firing at 9 40 
A. M., the eighteen field guns and twenty-six mountain 
guns keeping up an incessant cannonade. Several at- 
tempts were made to carry forward gun-cotton, but the 
men could not yet cross the zone of fire. 

The Tung-chi Gate, which was attacked by the Twenty- 
first Regiment, was captured in a similar manner to that 
of the Tse-hwa Gate, the outer and the inner gates being 
blown up by gun-cotton. Then the Twenty-first Regi- 
ment charged through the streets, and the enemy fled, 
leaving several hundreds of dead and seventy pieces of ar- 
tillery. 

The Forty-second Regiment, which had formed the 
main body of the division, took no part in the attack 
on the city. It entered Peking on the night of the 14th 
by the Tse-hwa Gate, after the latter had been blown up 
by the Eleventh Regiment and 200 rank and file killed or 
wounded. Major Murayama, who was in command of 



RELIEF OF PEKING. 99 

the leading battalion of the Eleventh Regiment, disposed 
his men to assist the attack on the Tse-hwa Gate, but as 
news reached him just then that the Russians had effected 
an entry at the Tung-pien Gate, he ordered the battalion 
to march thither, with the object of opening speedy com- 
munication with the legations. But the battalion, on 
reaching the gate, found that it had not been breached, 
and, therefore, the troops were marched back. At 6 
P. M., however, another message was received saying 
that the Tung-pien Gate had been breached, and the First 
and Third Battalions marched at once to the place, enter- 
ing in succession to the Russian troops. The Russians 
had experienced unlooked-for resistance, and had many 
killed and wounded, a number also falling into the en- 
emy's hands. 

Between the gate and the ground there was an interval 
sufficient for a man to creep through. Into this interval 
Captain Hayashi thrust himself, carrying a hand electric 
lamp. He was able to ascertain that the gates were 
formed of a single panel, and that the enemy were not in 
sight. Accordingly he and ten men crept under the gate, 
and, on ascending the parapet, found that the gate was 
constructed so as to be raised and lowered in a groove. 
They raised it sufficiently to allow of the passage of a 
horse, and the Japanese troops then took the lead, the 
Russians following. They reached the legations at 8:55 
P.M. 

It is impossible to describe the delight of the foreigners 

and the warmth of their thanks. We were not the first 

tu reach the legations, however, for the Indian troops 

w ere before us, having found a special route to the center 

of the city, and this they took with a small force. It was 

a brilliant acbieVement. Their plan of action was this: 
LafC. 



100 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

Between the British and the Japanese legations runs a 
canal; whicli has its exit under the city wall. The point 
where the canal emerges is guarded by an iron grating, 
which does not reach fully to the surface of the canal. It 
happened that the water in the canal was exceptionally 
low, and the British officers, taking advantage of the fact, 
let a body of Indian troops under the grating, a pro- 
ceeding against which the enemy had made no sort of 
preparation. These troops reached the legations at 2 
P. M. on the 14th. 

The measures for defense taken by the foreign com- 
munity were remarkably strong. All around the conces- 
sion and from thence to the Chinese town a brick parapet 
had been built. This parapet had been rebuilt several 
times, the extent being reduced on each occasion, so that 
it tells a plain tale of how the foreigners were gradually 
driven back. Ihe British legation had been regarded as 
the citadel. Sand bags were piled up in all the windows, 
and the defenses were of the most minute character. It 
is said that these defenses were planned chiefly by Rev. 
F. D. Gamewell and Lieutenant Colonel Shiba., 

The spirit of the garrison had never flagged, but their 
appearance indicated great exhaustion, the natural result 
of protracted anxiety and deficient provisions. The na- 
tive converts in the British legation often had nothing to 
eat but grass and leaves ; several of them died of starva- 
tion. I have myself seen many of them since the relief, 
who appear to be in an almost hopeless condition of ex- 
haustion. 

The sudden revulsion from death to life was almost 
too much for human nerves, "And there was great joy in 
the city." The next day the 7th verse of the 124th Psalm 




THE FLEEING OF THE COURT FROM PEKIN. 



RELIEF OF PEKING. 103 

was telegraphed home by Rev. Mr. Smith, as a summary 
of the situation : ''Our soul is escaped as a bird out of 
the snare of the fowlers ; the snare is broken and we are 
escaped." 

The loss by death of the allies in entering Peking was 
remarkably small, being, all told, under 130 men, or less 
than it cost to take the position at Pei-tsang, and very 
considerably less than the city of Tientsin. 

The clearing out of Peking has been finished. The 
enemy, consisting principally of the troops of the Eight 
Flags and of the Boxers, have retired, dispersing in all 
directions. Our guards for the palace have rescued and 
liberated the foreign Christians and native converts in 
other parts of the ctiy. 

The Empress Dowager and her court made their es- 
cape from the city through the Western Gate, taking the 
Emperor along as a prisoner. They left none too soon, 
for when they were going through the Western Gate the 
allied forces were coming in the Eastern Gate. They 
kept up their flight, over hill and dale, for many days, 
until they reached S'i-An-fu, the capital of Shen- 
si. Here they have taken up their abode and have opened 
up communication with Peking through Li-Hung-Chang 
and Prince Ching, who have been appointed as peace en- 
voys. 

NOTES ON THE SIEGE OF PEKING. 

The defense of the legations' pales, we are told by one 
of the besieged," began before the defense of the Pei-tang, 
or Roman Catholic Mission, at Peking. There were there 
Bishop Favier, six or seven priests, some twenty sisters 
and some 2,000 native converts, men women and chil- 
dren, with thirty French and ten Italian guards, only 



I04 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

forty rilles in all. When one of the guards fell his rifle 
was handed to a native convert. The enemy exploded 
five mines altogether under the besieged, in one of which 
some eighty persons, principally women and children, and 
five Italian guards were buried. The Italian officer was 
buried in it for three-quarters of an hour, and was got 
out almost unhurt. After the relief another large mine 
was discovered under the church itself, the explosion of 
which would have caused a tremendous loss of life. 
Electric conductors were found in this mine. The Pei- 
tang beat the legations in one thing — in that the converts 
succeeded in capturing one of the enemy's guns, with its 
ammunition, and in making ammunition for it when the 
captured supply came to an end. For two months there 
was no communication between the Pei-tang and the le- 
gations, and neither knew how the others were faring. 
At the end the rations at the Pei-tang were reduced to 
two ounces of rice a day a head, with a little horse meat 
for the fighting men, and if the relief had not come when 
it did the majority of the 2,000 converts, the priests and 
the sisters must have died of starvation. 



The relief w^as not a day too soon, as far as the mine 
under the British legation was concerned. As we have 
already mentioned, some traitor within the legation must 
have given the enemy the necessary information, for it 
was driven through the only place where the trenches 
running north and south, east and west did not quite 
meet. It came from the ruined Hanlin College, and was 
about 170 feet long, the chamber being underneath the 
students' quarters. There was one barrel of powder in 



RELIEF OF PEKING. Io5 

the chamber and twelve other barrels waiting to be 
stacked there, and the fuse was laid. Had it been ex- 
ploded the Japanese Minister and his family and staff 
would have been victims, for they were quartered in the 
students* premises, with several of the students them- 
selves and the mess of ^"he Royal Marines, and the loss 
of life would probably have been very large. 



Some of the Peking besieged are loud in their praise of 
the conduct of the American, as well as the British, mis- , > 
sionaries during the siege. As has already been men- 
tioned, the defenses of the British legation were .the fruit 
of the engineering talent of the Rev. F. D. Gamewell, of 
the American Methodist Episcopal Mission, who was as 
indefatigable as he was resourceful. The missionaries 
generally were not armed, and did not take their places 
in the fighting line, but they were most useful in many 
other equally valuable ways, and in their unabated cheer- 
fulness under all circumstances, which was often as good 
as a tonic to those who were wearied or inclined, as they 
were sometimes, to be despondent. One of the mission- 
aries started a bakery, there being a good stock of flour, 
from which he turned out excellent bread, and all made 
themselves useful one way or the other. The mission- 
aries were quartered in the legation chapel, and over 
eighty of them slept there. 

The commissariat might have been worse and it might 
have been better. There Avas plenty of rice, and two 
ponies were killed daily for meat. There were a very 
few sheep, J. R. Brazier, Chief Secretary of the Customs, 
being shepherd, but these were kept for the hospital. 



I06 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

Several children died for the want of milk. Eggs were 
occasionally procurable from a Chinese soldier, who also 
sold ammunition and false intelligence for a considera- 
tion. 

One very deplorable item was that there were not 
enough medicines and lint in the legation. There was 
only one bottle of chloroform available and no bandages. 
Had the siege lasted much longer, or had more serious 
explosions occurred, there would have been no help for 
the wounded. 

Throughout the siege the behavior of the ladies was 
beyond praise. After the first shock they went about 
their duties, tending the sick and wounded as calmly 
as trained nurses. Not one flinched, and they were ex- 
amples to some of the men. 

Although there were plenty of doctors, a lady. Dr. Sa- 
ville, shc\7ed conspicuous courage under fire, and was 
untiring in her efforts to relieve the sick and wounded. 

One sad occurrence was the wounding of a lady, the 
first lady hit in Peking after the occupation. While 
tending a wounded man, she was struck by a bullet in 
the thigh, and her attendant, a Sikh, was also wounded. 

In defiance of orders, the looting by the allies was uni- 
versal. It is curious to note that the Chinese were more 
frightened of the dusky faces of the British Indian troops 
than they wxre of their bullets. Upon entering the Im- 
V^ perial City the allied forces found in the carriage park 
arsenal many thousand stands of arms, also ammunition, 
cannon, etc., all of which were new and of German 
make. 



FEARFUL SUFFERING OF FOREIGNERS IN IN- 
LAND CHINA. 



Chapter XL 

The following accounts have been gathered, when pos- 
sible, from those who had to pass through these fearful 
trials. In some cases the information regarding the 
fiends were through native sources. Especially is this so 
in the case of the wholesale butchery by the infamous 
YuHsien, Governor of Shan-si, who at one time mur- 
(fered fifty-one men, women and children to satisfy his 
cruel hate of foreigners. 

A native Christian from Shan-si, vouched for by mis- 
sionaries who know him well, gives the following regard- 
ing the Shan-si massacre: Miss Whitchurch and Miss 
Sewell were murdered at Hsiao-i-hsien on the 29th of 
June. A crowd of Boxers came to the house, broke in 
the door and acted in a most alarming manner. The 
ladies, who were quite alone, sent at once to the Magis- 
trate, who came in person, flew into a rage, and told them 
his soldiers were for the protection of the Chinese, not 
for such as they. The Boxers then rushed into the house 
and removed everything of value, looting it thoroughly. 
The two helpless ladies were seized, stripped of all their 
clothes, and clubbed to death. After all was over the 
Magistrate returned and buried them in the baptistry. 



108 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

On the same day the house of Mr. Stokes, a C. I. M. 
missionary at Tai-yuan-fu, was attacked by soldiers. Mr. 
Stokes had some firearms, and he and the others in the 
house managed to keep the troops at bay for some time. 
They saw that they must be outnumbered, however, and 
as the soldiers prepared to fire the house, they made their 
escape by the back of the house to Mr. Farthing's EngHsh 
Baptist Mission. One lady, a Miss E. Coombs, however, 
in her anxiety about some native Christians, became sep>- 
arated from the others, and in the confusion she got left 
behind. The solcfiers caught her and knocked her down, 
but did not stun her. She pleaded with them for her life, 
but the ruffians seized and flung her into the burning 
building, where, it is to be hoped, her sufferings were 
brief. All the Protestant missionaries collected in Mr. 
Farthing's house, and there they stayed until summoned 
to Governor Yii's Yamen, on July 9th, under a promise 
of escort to Tientsin. This party consisted of Mr. and 
Mrs. Stokes, of the C. I. M. ; Mr. and Mrs. Simpson, 
Hsou-yang Mission; Mr. and Mrs. Beynon, with, it is 
believed, two children ; Mr. and Mrs. Farthing, with sev- 
eral children ; Dr. and Mrs. Wilson, C. I. M., Ping-yang- 
fu ; Dr. and Mrs. Lovitt, Dr. and Mrs. Piggott, child and 
tutor, of the Hsou-yang Mission, and others. 

Just at the end of June the English missionaries at 
Hsou-yang fled to the mountains, there being serious signs 
of trouble, and then, for some reason not quite clear, 
they returned there. They were immediately arrested by 
the Magistrate, who put them in chains, with iron collars 
round their necks, and sent them in carts to Tai-yaun-fu, 
refusing any food on the way. On arriving at Tai-yaun- 
fu, about the loth of the sixth moon, July 6th, they were 
sent to Governor Yii's Yamen, and then sent by him to 



SUFFERING IN INLAND CHINA. IO9 

the District Magistrate's Yamen, where they were shut 
up, the men and women being kept separate and the hus- 
bands and wives being refused all intercourse. 

Including the Hsou-yang party from Mr. Farthing's 
house already mentioned, their total number was fifty-one. 
When they were all in the Yamen, the doors were closed, 
and the missionaries realized that they had been trapped. 
They were not kept in suspense long. The Boxers were 
ordered to enter and slaughter them, the Governor's 
troops mounting guard while the ghastly deed was being 
done. No particulars are positively known about the 
massacre beyond the fact that the heads of all the victims 
were displayed outside the Yamen later in the day. On 
the same day forty native Christians were killed, and on 
the following day ten Catholic priests, in the same place 
and manner. 

The narrative then takes us to Tai-kou, on July 31st, 
where the Boxers attacked the mission there, first kill- 
ing the preacher, Mr. Fiu Fong-chi, and Mr. Liu, his as- 
sistant. Messrs. Clapp, Williams and Davis, who had 
firearms, fired on the Boxers from the roofs of their 
houses, and for a time kept them at bay, the ladies of the 
mission, Mrs. Clapp, Miss Bird and Miss Partridge, 
meanwhile taking refuge in one of the outhouses of the 
mission compound. They were soon overpowered and all 
killed, and the heads of the whole party were taken to 
Tai-yuan-fu. One hundred native Christians, including 
sixty Catholics, were also massacred at this place. 

His last story of massacre brings us to August 15th and 
Yen-chou-fu. There were at the station when the 
trouble began, Mr. and Mrs. Price and little girl, Mr. an d 
Mrs. Atwater and~two girls, belonging to the American 
BoarcT; Mr. and Mrs. Landgren and Miss Eldred, of the 



no CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

C. I. M. On the 15th of August the party were ordered 
by the Prefect to leave the place, he promising to give 
them a guard of twenty soldiers as an escort to Tien- 
tsin. The Prefect had been ordered to drive them out, 
and there was, therefore, no help for it but to go, and 
although the Magistrate again pleaded for a few days' 
delay it was refused, and early on the 15th they 
started under an escort of twenty soldiers. When they 
had gone about twenty li he discovered that another band 
of soldiers were lying in wait ten li further on, and, 
knowing he could not save them, he managed to get 
away. He subsequently learned that, on meeting the 
other band of soldiers, the escort gave a signal, and the 
little band of miss ionaries we re hackedji> pieces. Their 
Seafn was cruel and lingering. 

At Hao-lu he heard that some missionaries had escaped 
into the mountains, but had been captured by Boxers and 
handed over to officials, who had them sent to Chung- 
ting-fu. He was not sure of their names or fate. He 
went on to Chung-ting-fu, where he found the gates 
closed, on account of the numbers of Boxers who were 
looting all round the villages outside. He waited until 
the city guards opened the gates for a few minutes to let 
some persons through, when he slipped in and made his 
way to the Catholic Cathedral, which was uninjured, 
though, as above stated, some of the other missions were 
destroyed. In the Cathedral he found Mr. and Mrs. 
Griffith and child, and Mr. Brown, both of the China 
Inland Mission; a Catholic bishop, three priests, five 
nuns, all P>ench ; three Italians, one Belgian and one 
Frenchman, all railway engineers. 

Messrs. Brown and Griffith told him they had been 
driven from place to place until they had at last found 



SUFFERING IN INLAND CHINA. 



Ill 



refuge with the priest at Chung-ting-fu. They gave in- 
formant a slip of calico with "This mar» is trustworthy" 
on it, not caring to endanger his life by giving him a 




A VIEW OF PAO-TING-FU^ WHERE MANY MISSIONARIES 

WERE MASSACRED. 



letter, and told him to come to Tientsin as quickly as pos- 
sible and inform the military authorities of their posi- 
tion, He arrived at Tientsin late on Saturday night and 



112 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

gave his statement to the authorities on Sunday morning. 

We have also obtained the follow^ing narrative from 
one of the unfortunate Belgian engineers, who has lately 
reached here from Pao-ting-fu. No attempt has been 
made to describe the sufferings of the party, especially 
the women, but those who saw the first party arrive and 
can imagine what four days' exposure at this hot season 
without food or drink and being hunted like wild ani- 
mals means will realize how keen those sufferings were 
The writer states : 

''On Sunday, May 27th, four of us were in the train 
due at Liu-li-ho at 4 p.m. In the neighborhood of Cho- 
chow our train stopped. The station master told us the 
Boxers had destroyed the bridges and track. We imme- 
diately backed the train to Kao-pei-tien, where we found 
1,900 soldiers, under the command of a general, who re- 
fused to encounter the Boxers, protesting that he had no 
orders from his chief on the subject. The train then 
started for Pao-ting-fu. The following day, 28th, we, 
seven other engineers and myself, left Pao-ting-fu on a 
special train at 4 a. m., with materials for repairing the 
track. On our arrival at Kao-pei-tien a band of villagers, 
incited by Boxers, rifled the train and station, leaving 
nothing but bare walls. The next day we all left Pao- 
ting-fu under escort — thirty-two men, six women and 
one little girl of three years. 

"About 3 o'clock we secured twelve sampans, one oc- 
cupied by the mandarin. Sun, and another by the interpre- 
ter. The former left us next day about 4 p. m. Orders 
were given by him to shut in the sampans entirely. On 
Tuesday, at 5 a. m., the Boxers, who had been waiting 
for us at the hills, opened fire on the boats, seven of our 
party being wounded by the volley. The soldiers escort- 



SUFFERING IN INLAND CHINA. II3 

ing US thereupon decamped, and as soon as they were 
gone the boatmen dropped anchor and refused to go on. 
We then went on shore and faced the Boxers, and fell 
back on the plains, where we gave them battle and suc- 
ceeded in putting them to flight after killing several. We 
then discovered that four of our party were missing. We 
reached another river, but were followed by the mob. 
Two of us swam out and secured a boat, in which we got 
the whole party over to the other bank. Before long we 
discovered another mob on our track, and had to fight 
some fifty Boxers. About midday we again reached the 
river. The women were exhausted, the men for the 
most part demoralized. We had had nothing to eat or 
drink since we left the evening before. To proceed on 
foot was impossible. 

''Though the river was deep and wide, and we were 
much exhausted, two of us sv/am out again and detached 
a boat from a bend in the river. We remained in this till 
8 in the evening, the strongest of our party going along 
the bank as an escort. Then we found ourselves between 
two fires. Behind us came a small mob, while men armed 
with guns awaited us on either bank. We had to fight 
again, and though we killed several we had to retreat 
once more to the plains, where we succeeded in keeping 
up such a murderous fi.re that the enemy retreated. We 
stayed thereabouts all night, and started out again the 
next morning to try and reach Tientsin. Early on 
Wednesday morning we were three times in contact with 
the Boxers, and each time we killed or wounded many. 
About midday, on nearing a big village, we were obliged 
to wage a regular battle again, the Boxers numbering 
more than a thousand and led by a mounted leader, who 
was protected by four gingals. We thought our last 



TI4 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

hour had come, and bade farewell to each other; but the 
yoimger men determined to make one more effort. A 
desperate charge on our part made them abandon their 
gingals, and the mob then fled, followed by our shots. 
Great courage was shown by several members of our 
party. We then resumed our tramp to Tientsin, still 
some 200 li away. At about 4 p. m. we had repulsed the 
Boxers several times, but they kept reforming. Each 
time we killed several of the mob, which had the effect 
of driving them away. In the evening we camped in a 
marsh, after having crossed a small river, and resumed 
our journey about 3 a. m. We cut the lines of the enemy 
about 4 a. m., and surprised an advance post, whose ob- 
ject was to stop our progress. But we routed this de- 
tachment, and this was the last encounter we had, and 
finally reached Tientsin." 



ESCAPED FROM SHAN-SI. 

A TERRIBLE STORY. 

Of all the provinces, Shan-si holds the record for dia- 
bolical massacres and barbarities. At one time it looked 
as if not a single foreigner could by any possibility es- 
cape the murderous purpose of Yii Hsien, whom our 
Ministers so supine!}^ allowed to be made governor there. 
Fortunately, some have escaped. A party of refugees 
from Shan-si arrived here (Hankow) to-day, after en- 
countering such sufferings and hairbreadth escapes as 
will be difficult to find a parallel anywhere. 

The party consisted of Mr. and Mrs. A. R. Saunders, 
with two children (other twQ of their children died on 



SUFFERING IN INLAND CHINA. II5 

the way), and Mr. A. Jennings and Miss Guthrie, all 
from Ping-yao ; Mr. E. J. Cooper and two children, from 
Lu-cheng (Mrs. Cooper, Miss Rice and Miss Houston, 
also from that city, were killed on the way or died from 
injuries received) ; Mr. and Mrs. A. E. Glover, with two 
children, and Miss Gates, from Lu-an. All are members 
of the China Inland Mission, and of the nineteen who 
started five perished. 

The story they tell is as follows : ''All was quiet in 
Ping-yao up to the 25th of June. The Magistrate was 
friendly, and had issued a proclamation denouncing the 
Boxers and promising protection to foreigners and Chris- 
tians. We were aware that there was trouble on the 
route between us and Tientsin, but did not know much 
as to what was going on, or anticipate danger. On that 
day, however, we received a letter from Tai-yuan, inclos- 
ing a copy of a proclamation which had just been issued 
by Yii Hsien, the governor, in which the people were 
informed that China was at war with foreigners, and 
that all foreign devils must be destroyed. On the back 
of that we learned that our Magistrate was having his 
favorable proclamation taken down from the walls, and 
that a mob had already begun to demolish our chapel in 
the city. Later on, in the evening, a mob arrived at our 
house in the suburb, and we were driven to take refuge 
in the Yamen. The Magistrate declared he could not help 
us. He had received orders no longer to protect for- 
eigners, and bade us depart in peace. At length, in an- 
swer to our entreaties, he agreed to send us to Tai-yuan, 
150 li distant, under escort, so we started north for the 
capital. We got within 20 li of it without adventure, 
when we met a native Christian, whom we knew, fleeing 
south. He implored us to turn back, as the Inland Mis- 



Il6 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

sion had already been burned, the Roman CathoHc estab- 
Hshment pulled down, and all the foreigners were in the 
Baptist Mission compound surrounded by a great mob, 
who were threatening to burn it with all who were inside. 
On this we turned back toward Ping-yao, and our escort 
at once left us. We had not much money, and the people 
demanded exorbitant prices for everything, even for the 
simple permission tO' pass along the road. We sold our 
clothes and pawned whatever would pawn, including our 
wedding rings, and in this way reached our station at 
Lu-cheng, safe but stripped. 

"Lu-cheng had not yet been rioted, but only two days' 
peace was allowed us, when, with the friends there, we 
had to flee for our lives at midnight, with nothing but 
one donkey load of bedding and clothes and supply of 
silver, which we divided up among the party. Which 
direction to take we did not know. To go north again 
was out of the question, and eastward to Shan-tung was 
equally impossible, so we made for the south, hoping to 
get through Honan and Hupeh to Hankow. But we had 
only got 40 li from Lu-cheng, when we were stopped at 
a large village by some two hundred people, who de- 
manded money. We could not satisfy them, so they 
seized our donkey, and in sheer wanton mischief tore all 
our bedding and clothes to pieces. Then they stripped us 
next, taking each person's clothes, hat, shoes and stock- 
ings, and little store of silver, leaving us nothing, ladies 
and children alike, but a single pair of native drawers 
each. In this affair we lost the natives who were accom- 
panying us, some of whom we fear were killed, while we 
were driven along the road by men with clubs. It was a 
terrible situation. The blazing sun burned us to the 
bone, and some of us had not so much as a little piece of 



SUFFERING IN INLAND CHINA. II/ 

rag to wet and put on the top of our heads. At every 
village we were attacked and driven from one to the other 
with blows and curses. The villages there are very thick, 
and before we got clear of the mob from one the mob 
from the next had already arrived to take us in hand. 
Neither food nor water could be obtained. How we con- 
trived to exist we hardly know. For days our only sup- 
port was found in the filthy puddles by the roadside. 
When we reached a city it was a little better. Apparently, 
each Magistrate was anxious that we should come to our 
end in the next county, so when we went to the Yamen 
they would give us a little food and send an escort to see 
us safely over the borders of that particular Yamen's 
jurisdiction. Arrived at that point, the escort always left 
us, and we had to struggle on as before. 

*'Miss Rice was killed on the road 50 li north of Tseh- 
chau-fu, in Shan-si. That day both she and Miss Houston 
sat down on the roadside, saying they would willingly 
die, but walk another step they could not. In the previous 
city the Magistrate had given us a small piece of silver, 
which we had to carry in our hands, having nowhere else 
to put it. We thought we might be able to hire a cart 
for these ladies with this piece of silver, so two of us 
went to a village to negotiate. The villagers refused the 
cart, but at the same time they pounded our knuckles 
with a stick till we dropped the silver, and then drove us 
down the road away from our party. Just then it began 
to rain, and the party, with the exception of the two 
ladies, retired for shelter to an empty guard-house near. 
There a mob fell upon them and drove them on, and in 
this way the two helpless ladies got left and were beaten 
to death. Nothing could be done till Tseh-chau was 
reached, when the Magistrate sent back to inquire. Miss 



Il8 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

Rice was found to be already dead, but Miss Houston, 
although dreadfully injured, was still alive. She died 
afterward at Yun-mung, in Hupeh, and the body was 
brought on to Hankow for burial. 

''The crossing of the Yellow River was one of our most 
trying experiences. The Yamen had placed us in carts, 
and promised to send us over. But as soon as we were in 
the boat the carts drove away, and the boatmen ordered 
us to land again, as they declined pointblank to have 
anything to do with us. For two days we sat on the bank 
of the Yellow River, not knowing what to do. We were 
like the Israelites at the Red Sea. Pharaoh was behind ; 
neither right nor left was there any retreat and no means 
of crossing over. On the third day the boatmen unex- 
pectedly changed their minds and took us over. 

"The first city we came to south of the river was 
Chang-chou. The Magistrate here was bitterly anti-for- 
eign, and said had we only arrived twenty-four hours 
sooner he would have had the pleasure of killing us all. 
His orders were to^ allow no foreign devil to- escape, but 
the Empress-Dowager had taken pity on them, and he 
had just been instructed to have them all sent as pris- 
oners into Hupeh. Accordingly, from this point we were 
sent on across Honan, from city to city, as prisoners, by 
the Yamens, some in carts and sometimes mounted on the 
hard wooden pack saddles of donkeys. For food they 
gave us bread and water, and nowhere showed us any 
kindness till we reached Sin-yang-chou, the last city in 
Honan. Here we were no longer treated as prisoners, 
and here we met with the Glovers, from Lu-an, who had 
arrived there after a similar journey. The Hupeh Mag- 
istrates were exceedingly kind. At the first city, Ying- 
shan, we were supplied with food and clothing and kept 



I20 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

in the Yamen five days, as the road south was blocked by 
soldiers proceeding to Peking, whom it would not be 
safe to meet. The Ying-shan native Christians also 
sought us out and showed us great kindness, as they also 
did at the cities of Teh-ngan, Yun-mung and Hsao-kan. 
Mrs. E. J. Cooper died at Ying-shan of the injuries and 
hardships undergone, and her body was brought tO' Han- 
kow for burial. Mrs. Glover was confined a few days 
after their arrival at Hankow. The child was dead, and 
in a short time she, too, passed over the river, and is with 
her blessed Lord. Thus ended at Hankow, on the 14th 
of August, a journey of fifty days' duration, of which the 
wonder is that a single one survived to tell the tale." 



The Rev. Father Jeremiah was delivered in a most 
marked manner. His station was at Pa-shan, Hunan. 
His life was saved by an old Chinese woman, who, 
though a heathen, was moved to pity by his distressed 
condition and hid him for six days in a rice box. At the 
end of the six days the disturbance had subsided some- 
what, and he managed to get away to Hankow. 

The Rev. Father Stephanus Sette, who had charge of 
the station at Hing-shui, Hunan, was attacked on the 
4th of July, and he ow^es his escape to the reverence of 
the Chinese for the remains of the dead. He was 
dumped in a box somewhat resembling a cofiin, and in 
this way was carried by native Christians a distance of 
over 300 li (100 miles) to Lien-chau, the journey taking 
about seven days. The party was frequently stopped on 
the way, but when informed that the box contained hu- 
man remains, which were being carried to their native 
country for burial, all inquiries were satisfied. 



SUFFERING IN INLAND CHINA. 121 

On reaching Lien-chau, one of the native Christians 
hunted up a boatman, who agreed to take him and two 
friends to Canton for $io. When he found out, however, 
that one of the party was a European he said he should 
want much more pay, and ultimately $50 was agreed 
upon. During the trip down the river the boatman, think- 
ing this a good chance to make money, threatened to 
have Father Sette thrown overboard unless 300 ounces of 
silver was forthcoming. The party had nothing like the 
amount with them, but, putting on a bold front, they in- 
formed the man that he could have double that amount 
if he took them safely to Canton, where, they said, the 
missionary had a rich brother residing. He accordingly 
landed them safely in Canton and accompanied them to 
the head of the Roman Catholic Mission there, and sub- 
sequently to the French Consul, who gave him a fair 
recompense for his trouble. 



A Boxer who saw the murder of Mr. Chao, an evan- 
gelist of the London Mission, and of Mr. Liu, an inquirer 
of the same mission, gave the following account of the 
occurrence to a friend of his in this city : 

''On May 12th the Boxers crossed the River Tsz-tsun, 
about three li from Kung-tsun, when they met Mr. Liu. 
They recognized him as one of the adherents of the 
Christian Church and at once attacked him and wounded 
him with their swords. Then they took him and tied him 
up securety to a tree on the bank of the river. This done, 
they proceeded to the London Mission Chapel at Kung- 
tsun, found Mr. Chao, the evangelist, bound his tumbs 
and great toes tightly together and carried him to a tree 
near to that on which Mr. Liu was bound. They then 



122 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

chopped off Mr. Liu's arms, disemboweled him, cut off 
his head and cast all into the river. Afterward all set to 
work in fury and hacked Mr. Chao into pieces and threw 
the fragments into the riv^r. Then they returned tO' the 
chapel at Kung-tsun, looted the furniture, smashed the 
inscription board to pieces and went away." 

The Christians, being forewarned, left the place the 
day before the murders took place. They begged Mr. 
Chao to come away, but he absolutely refused, saying: 
'T was sent here to work for the Church, and it is my 
duty to stay. If I lose my life for the sake of religion, I 
shall be content, and it will be an honor to my name." 




STORY OF THE FLIGHT OF THE MEMBERS OF 
THE CANADIAN PRESBYTERIAN MISSION. 



By T. Craigie Hood. 



Chapter XII. 

Everything seemed perfectly quiet in North Honan 
when, on June 4th, Drs. McClure and Menzies, with 
their famiHes, and Dr. Margaret S. Wallace, set out by 
houseboat for Pei-tai-ho via Tientsin. We had no thought 
of being disturbed, except, perhaps, that a famine, whose 
certain coming became every day more evident as the 
rain held ofT, might cause us trouble. Scarcely a week 
had gone by when news came to us of the Pao-ting-fu 
trouble, and we found our mail service cut off and our 
communication with the outside world broken. 

On June 14th we received, via Liu-ching, a telegram, 
which ran somewhat as follows : "Traveling toward 
Tientsin unsafe ; foreign troops rescuing Peking ; all es- 
cape south." On June 15th a local disturbance arose. 
That morning a Chinese woman was washing the up- 
stairs windows of Mr. Mackenzie's new foreign-built 
house at Chu-wang, when some women on the street 
caught sight of her and immediately started the report 



124 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

that just as the clouds were gathering and the rain begin- 
ning to fall the "foreign devils" were seen waving a cloth 
with strange characters on it, and this drove the clouds 
away. A fruit-seller spread the report through the town, 
and soon a mob of about i,ooo people were at the com- 
pound gate clamoring for admittance, and could scarcely 
be restrained by the officials. The days that followed 
were anxious ones. Every few days the mob would be- 
come frantic and threaten the lives of the missionaries. 
Reports from the north of alleged Boxer successes, and 
a report that Dr. McClure and party had been murdered, 
added fuel to the fire. On June 25th we received a tele- 
gram from Dr. AlcClure, who had escaped with his party 
to Chi-nan-fu, having been stopped by the Pang-chwang 
missionaries in time to prevent their running into the 
death-trap before them. This telegram said: 'Towers 
occupy Taku ; consuls urge all foreigners leave ; come im- 
mediately to Chi-nan; steamer waiting." This, added to 
the local troubles, decided us to leave. We were com- 
pelled to take the southern route. On June 27th the Chu- 
wang friends left their station and came to Shang-te. 
They left not a day too soon. The night before had been 
spent by them in a Chinese home that was kindly thrown 
open to them. The mob had already begun to loot some 
of the houses that night, and next morning, a couple of 
hours after they left their houses, dispensaries, hospital 
buildings and chapel were being torn down. We left 
Chang-te with ten carts early next morning, June 28th, 
having been provided with a good escort. On July ist 
we reached the Yellow River, and there joined the mem- 
bers of our third station, Hsin-chen. They were travel- 
ing with Messrs. Jameson, Reid and Fisher, of the Pe- 
king Syndicate, who had a good escort. 



FLIGHT OF MISSIONARIES. I25 

All that week we wended our way to the southward. 
On Saturday, July 7th, we reached a region which 
seemed to be very much disturbed. Our escort had grad- 
ually dwindled down till we had none at all. Mr. Jame- 
son felt that his escort was not sufficient to protect both 
parties, so he decided to leave our party at Hsin-tien, 
while he pressed on 30 li to Nan-yang-fu to ask for an 
escort for us and for his own party. We had scarcely 
got settled in our inn at Hsin-tien when the mayor of the 
town came to us and told us that a gang of about one 
hundred were going to attack and rob us. He advised 
us to buy them off with a few tens of silver, but we re- 
fused, for we felt that this would not insure us against 
them even then taking what might be left. We barri- 
caded our inn doors with carts, etc., and prepared to de- 
fend ourselves as best we could, meanwhile sending word 
of the threat to Mr. Jameson. The night passed without 
our being- disturbed. About 8 o'clock next morning word 
came from Mr. Jameson that the official would neither 
see him nor give him nor us an escort. We must all get 
through as best we could. 

We left the inn at Hsin-tien at about 8.30 a. m. The 
streets were packed with people, and over the city gate 
hung hundreds of spectators upon the wall. The crowd 
outside the gate has been estimated at 10,000. But these 
were not the fiends, except that now we think they took 
a fiendish delight in watching us pass on to what they 
thought was our doom. Outside of this crowd we were 
passing along an ordinary deep Chinese road, where there 
was showered down upon us a perfect hailstorm of 
stones, bricks, clubs, etc., etc. The carters whipped up 
the animals and made a mad dash to get through, but the 
mob shot and slashed and pounded the mules till they 



126 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

were killed or disabled, and thus brought us to a stand- 
still. My cart was wedged in among four or five others. 
My first glance about me told me that the fearful fight 
was on. The swords and spears and clubs were now 
turned, not against the mules, but against the mission- 
aries. In front of me Mr. Griffith was sitting in his cart, 
the blood streaming from his forehead and hands. The 
second stone thrown at him had smashed his revolver in 
pieces. A sweep with a sword had been aimed at his 
head, but his hat prevented it making a very deep gash. 
He sprang from his cart, and, seizing a club that lay 
near, defended himself against the brute who was attack- 
ing him. On my right Mr. Mackenzie was valiantly de- 
fending his wife and little son, while his upper garments 
were literally saturated with his own blood. On the left 
was Mr. Goforth, being beaten over the head with clubs, 
any blow from which was enough to kill him had he not 
been able to ward them off to some extent. When I 
glanced toward him again the blood was streaming from 
an ugly sword gash in the back of his head and from a 
cut in his left arm. The ladies and children had been 
ordered from the carts, and stood in different places, 
while the stones and bricks flew about them in all direc- 
tions. I did not see Dr. Leslie attacked. I am thankful 
I did not see that awful hacking. 

Well, all this and far more (for I haven't said anything 
about the soldiers, who fought so nobly for us and who 
were slashed and stabbed and trampled under their 
horses' feet right before my eyes) passed before me in 
far less time than it takes to tell it. Stones hurled in at 
the front of my cart told me that it was time to> leave it. 
I got down and seized a rock and thought that with this 
I would try to keep the fiends at a safe distance. In a 



FLIGHT OF MISSIONARIES. 12 7 

few moments there came a lull in the fight. All seemed 
to be busy with the looting, except the brute who had at- 
tacked Mr. Griffith and had also attacked Mr. Mackenzie 
several times. 

He still stood and threatened to kill us, while he swung 
his sword about his head in the fiercest fashion possible. 
I think I never saw such a hellish look on a human face. 
At last he snatched a pig-skin trunk that Mr. Griffith 
threw to him, snatched it as a ravenous wolf would 
snatch a child, and ran off to his companions to see what 
it contained. Some of our number had already escaped 
from the scene of conflict, and we who were left, taking 
advantage of the lull, gathered ourselves together into a 
little company and began to walk slowly away. We were 
twice surrounded by men with swords and daggers and 
compelled to give up our watches, rings, etc. They even 
took parts of our clothing, leaving us barely enough to 
cover ourselves. It was an hour or so before we knew 
that every member of the party had got away alive. Mr. 
Goforth was quite seriously wounded. He and his family 
were taken in by a Mohammedan family and kindly 
cared for. Dr. Leslie was very seriously wounded. Mr. 
Mackenzie's and Mr. Griffith's wounds were of a superfi- 
cial nature. The rest of us (seven adults and five chil- 
dren) had escaped practically without a bruise or a 
scratch. Dr. Leslie had been hacked twelve or fifteen 
times. After he had received all these wounds, and he 
and Mrs. Leslie were away from the carts altogether, a 
fiend came up to attack them again, and would have killed 
them (the doctor surely couldn't bear much more), 
when, raising his revolver in his left hand, the doctor 
sent the last bullet he had into the fiend's face and drove 
him away. Just at this stage my ''boy" whipped out one 



128 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

of the carts, picked up one of the ladies and one of the 
children and Dr. and Mrs. Leslie, and thus they escaped, 
after having passed through the ordeal of being searched 
in the way we had been. When we overtook the cart the 
doctor had lost so much blood that he could scarcely 
speak. One of the ladies tore her underskirt intO' band- 
ages and Dr. Dow hastened to bind up his wounds. The 
carter took him on for five or six li and then declared he 
would go no farther. We had to carry the doctor into a 
small guard-house by the roadside and lay him on some 
straw mats. There we were, with no food, no "cash," 
and no means of going forward. 

Toward evening a military official from Nan-yang-fu 
and twenty or thirty horse-soldiers came along, and we 
hoped they would help us. Word had been sent to the 
officials of the robbery, and these soldiers had been sent 
out to look into the matter. Shortly after they reached 
us our carts unexpectedly came along, and we got on 
them, expecting that the soldiers would escort us intO' the 
city as our only hope of getting money. But instead of 
escorting us, they deliberately rode off and left us to get 
along as best we could. The crowd from the city came 
out for half a mile or more to meet us, and as we passed 
on it gathered fiends as a flood gathers debris. We man- 
aged to get into an inn, but we weren't the only ones who 
got in. Officials were sent for, but would do nothing to 
keep the crowds out. They ordered us to leave at once. 
We demanded (we could afford to talk strongly— it was 
a case of desperation) food and money and protection. 
They brought us food and nineteen tiao (about $io), and 
promised an escort of twenty horses and forty foot-sol- 
diers and said we must go at once. We refused to move 
until the escort should appear ; we waited in vain, at least 



FLIGHT OF MISSIONARIES. 12 9 

as far as that number of soldiers was concerned. At last 
eight or ten foot-soldiers appeared, and as it was after 
midnight, and things were black, we concluded we had 
better start. The people told us we would not be allowed 
to get out alive. The soldiers and officials went to our 
servants and tried to persuade them tO' leave us, as we 
were all to be killed. The Roman Catholics of the place 
were defending themselves in a ''chai," and we were to be 
murdered before this to terrify them. Why we were al- 
lowed to escape we shall perhaps never know. In getting 
out of the city Mr. Griffith and Paul Go forth (aged nine) 
were mysteriously separated from the party, and we saw 
nothing more of them till midnight next night, when they 
managed to overtake us. That day we passed through a 
very disturbed region. Thousands of people rushed 
wildly through the country. They would gather in mobs 
by the roadside and wait our coming. If we were stopped 
once that day, we were stopped thirty times, and would 
have been robbed as often had we had anything they 
could take. The carters made matters worse by driving 
at a mad rate. Imagine, if you can, what Dr. Leslie must 
have suffered as he lay flat in the cart, his head bumping 
over the axle, and his wounded limbs jolting about. Im- 
agine what the women and children suffered, for all the 
carts were practically without quilts, cushions, etc. That 
night, at Hing-yie-hsien, the officials offered us four tiao. 
Mr. Jameson had heard of the robbery, and immediately 
sent a man back to meet us with fifty taels of silver, and 
this reached us in time to enable us to refuse the four 
tiao. However, those officials gave us a splendid escort, 
and next day, although thousands of people lined the 
roads, neither man nor boy dared open mouth against us, 



130 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

SO well did those soldiers do their work. We reached 
Fan-cheng that evening, Tuesday, July loth, about 8 
o'clock, just fourteen days from the time the start was 
made. The members of the Peking Syndicate supplied us 
liberally with silver, and they and the Hsin-chen friends 
gave us what clothing they could spare. There was a 
real ''community of goods" for the remainder of the trip. 

Both parties boarded the houseboats shortly after mid- 
night, and were escorted down the Han River by two 
Chinese gunboats, provided by Chang Chih-tung. We 
reached Hankow in about ten days, having been towed 
for the last 300 li by a steam launch sent out by the con- 
suls at Hankow. 

The flight had been hard, but its lessons for us were 
not a few. We were shown how helpless we are and 
what a mighty God is ours. We understand more fully 
then we ever before understood the greatness of that 
greatest of all the great needs — the need of giving the 
Gospel of Jesus Christ to the heathen, especially the 
Chinese heathen. 



ARE THE MISSIONARIES RESPONSIBLE? 



Chapter XIII. 

Certain shortsighted people attribute all the present 
trouble to the pernicious influence of missionaries. Some, 
no doubt, have made mistakes, but to those whO' take the 
trouble to go into the matter thoroughly there is no deny- 
ing the fact that the good done by far' outweighs the evil. 
The patience, devotion and heroism with which the mis- 
sionaries, both men and women, have met and endured the 
afflictions of the last two months cannot but be admired. 
It has been well said that the i ^th ch apter of Hebrews is 
being rewritten in China. 

The Chinese Recorder also asks and answers the ques- 
tion thus : ''Are the missionaries responsible for the pres- 
ent crisis? Yes and no. If furnishing good literature, 
books on history, astronomy, mathematics, philosophy, 
morals and religion, many of which fell into the hands of 
the Emperor and others, and caused the reform edicts 
— books and literature, the tendency of which, like Paul's 
preaching was to turn such a country as China 'upside 
down,' then the missionaries are responsible, though we 
can scarcely see how they are to blame.'' 

A writer to the "Celestial Empire" speaks forth the 
truth boldly, and it is worth repeating. He says : 

"Sir: The blind objections to missionaries being made 



132 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

by some writers just now exhibit a want of thought and 
discrimination. Not a missionary myself, I, from the 
purely commercial standpoint, appreciate their devoted la- 
bors, their moral example and influence. The great ma- 
jority of the Protestant missionaries wisely have refrained 
from assuming or desTring^any official status, and in doing 
so have avoided making themselves stumbling blocks to 
the non-Christian natives, as the Roman Catholics have 
done. 

"But the foreign resident who now rushes into- print 
demanding that missionary labors cease in China is want- 
ing in the exercise of common sense. The missionary, 
with good reason, might retort that all commercial men 
and civilian foreigners should be deported, because the 
lives of a number of them in the treaty ports are an out- 
rage on all the best ideas of the natives and a libel on 
Western civilization. In the Boxer placards it has been 
said that 'foreign men disregard all the human obliga- 
tions and their women commit adultery.' Now, in nO' in- 
stance can this be asserted of the missionaries in China, 
but, unfortunately, it does hold true of a certain minority 
among the foreign residents. Instead of clamoring for 
the expulsion of all foreign residents because of the sins 
of the few, the missionaries are level-headed enough to 
see that what is needed is not expulsion, bi^t decided pro- 
test by all those foreigners who desire the higher stand- 
ards of their respective nations to be emphasized in this 
land. The protest should be made privately ixnd publicly, 
both in and out of the press, so that the natives around 
us can plainly see that foreign public opinion does not 
for a moment condone what its highest ideals distinctly 
condemn. The man or woman of foreign birth who lives 




^ .ms^m 



A TYPICAL '"boxer/" WITH ALL HIS IMPLEMENTS OF 

WARFARE. 



134 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

an immoral life, the foreigner who ill-treats a coolie as he 
would not dare for an instant to treat a common cabman ; 
the Westerner, be he an ordinary private individual or a 
city father, who encourages, establishes or patronizes lot- 
teries ; in fact, any among the foreign communities in 
China who any way lower the standard of life they have 
in the home lands been taught to respect and aim at, do 
more to prepare the way for corrupt officials, bent on 
stirring up the ignorant people of China, than all the mis- 
takes of all the missionaries put together. The writer is 
well aware that among certain conceited, sick-brained 
circles it is fashionable to deride the methods, objects and 
personal characters of missionaries ; and while not claim- 
ing for them absolute perfection, nor asserting that they 
are free altogether of minor errors, it is certain that, tak- 
ing them in a body, the percentage of those among them 
that are actuated by selfish motives is minure. The num- 
ber among them who fail to give an example O'f pure 
morality in their stations in the interior and elsewhere is 
less than the proportion of similar failures among the es- 
tablished clergy of home lands. 

''Even the Consular services owe to missionary work- 
ers in the past, as also to several who are still among us. 
But when consideration is carefully given to the fact that 
all over the interior, in places where the foreigner is 
otherwise unknown, he is first introduced m the person O'f 
a missionary, who lives quietly a moral life, so that all his 
immediate neighbors, on close acquaintance, acquire a 
favorable knowledge of an individual foreigner, and from 
that particular knowledge argue favorably in general of 
foreigners. 

"All over the empire, again and again, in times of 



ARE MISSIONARIES RESPONSIBLE? 1 35 

trouble and riot, the immediate acquaintances of the mis- 
sionaries, as well as the converts, have stood by their for- 
eign teachers at the peril of their ovv^n lives, proving con- 
clusively the good opinions won by the example of their 
lives and teachings. All through the horrid riots of 
1 89 1 -2 the native converts remained faithful, not only to 
their missionary pastors (laying down, in some instances, 
their own lives to save the foreigner's), but also were 
stanch to their faith, in spite of all tortures and persecu- 
tions, too horrible to relate in detail. Such centres of en- 
lightenment as to what foreigners are and have to give 
the Chinese open up the country ready for trade, and 
again and again can the demand for foreign goods be 
traced directly to the influence of missionaries in the 
interior. 

' ''If trade follows the flag, it is because the flag is usu- 
ally made known by a good introduction on the part of 
missionaries. Withdraw your missionaries and send into 
the interior your young, rowdy man, with his 'sleeping 
dictionary' concubines, his drunkenness and bullying con- 
duct, and see how much worse your trade and reputation 
will soon be. It is high time that we dropped all mad talk 
about missionaries, and instead of trying to make scape- 
goats of any one section of foreign residents, while en- 
deavoring to reform all those evils that prejudice us in 
the eyes of the natives, show that we know that behind all 
anti-foreign agitation is the Peking Government, as chief 
instigator and offender. The d ay will never come wh en 
jT iissionaries are withdrawn from Ch ina, but if it did, the 
writer, as a commercial man, would venture to prophesy, 
with certainty, the early ruin of foreign trade with China. 
The criticism of their objects comes ill from men whose 



136 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

whole heritage of worth is the main result of similar prop- 
aganda in their own native lands in the past. At the 
foundation of much ill-natured, ignorant criticism of mis- 
sionaries, and the real cause of the lying reports that are 
spread abroad, is an uncomfortable feeling, resulting from 
the critics often living in a manner that would, if known, 
shut them out from their own parental roof. Where mis- 
sionaries live in the interior, away from all foreign civil- 
ians or officials, there are no houses of ill-fame kept for or 
by foreigners. In such places there are no lotteries 
licensed by and supported by foreigners. There no na- 
tives are cuffed and kicked, for there are no rowdy for- 
eign 'drunks' to drag their nation's character in the mire. 
Ninety per cent, of the foreigners who glibly calumniate 
the missionaries have absolutely no real knowledge of the 
subject on which they air their gaseous opinions. Few 
of them have ever visited a mission station or seen a na- 
tive convert. If they had, the writer can testify that often 
the native convert's character and life would cause many 
a foreigner to hang his head in shame for better oppor- 
tunities unavailed of. When 'loaves and fishes' are quoted 
as the raison d'etre of missionaries being in China, it 
never occurs to the uncultured, ill-educated carpers that 
they should first make sure of the past history of those 
whom they so readily vilify, or they might discover that 
never was assertion more unfounded and that many now 
in the mission field have given up freely more than their 
small-brained mud-flingers are ever likely to attain. 
'When the wine is in the fool comes out,' and hotel and 
club bar critics we will waste no more space on." 



THE FUTURE OUTLOOK. 



Chapter XIV. 

It is believed by some who^ understand the Chinese 
and the present situation in their land that the difficulties 
are only beginning, and that there are yet many months, 
and perhaps years, of trial for Christians, both native and 
foreign, who undertake to propagate the Gospel in China. 
Many are puzzled about the whole situation. To' others 
it seems clear that the cost of life and treasure is sO' great 
that the end gained by preaching Christ to the Chinese 
does not justify it. The heart of the believer feels faint 
as it dwells upon the past of suffering and sorrow, and it 
is tempted to tremble as it looks into the future. It feels 
keenly the disappointment that a prosperous work has 
fallen, and is moved with sympathy for the suffering vic- 
^tims of pagan cruelties. Thus touched, it is not out of 
place to look up to Him who worketh all things according 
to the counsel of His own will and reverently ask, ''Why 
does He permit all this sorrow and pain and bloodshed ?" 

This is no new question, for the Church has not forgot- 
ten the terrible price in human blood that was paid for 
the introduction of Christianity into the Roman Empire, 
and the fierce measures which were taken for the exter- 
mination of the new religion. Evangelical churches do 
not allow their children to forget the lirnmess with which 
our fathers stogd for the truths of the Gospel and endured 



% 



138 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

the fiendish tortures of the ''Holy Inquisition." Every 
glorious page in the history of the Church is written in 
blood, and this is not the time to count God's authority 
less absolute, or His message to the lost less worthy of a 
martyr's blood than in other centuries. 

It does not diminish the glory of those whoi have suf- 
fered that the cause of their persecution is largely the 
political aggression of the Western nations and the intol- 
erable meddling of Romish agents in the internal affairs 
of China. The charge against Christ was the false one of 
sedition. Nero's persecution was founded on the untruth- 
ful story that the Christians had set fire tO' Rome, and 
missionary martyrs of recent years have frequently suf- 
fered because the natives confounded them with the 
traders who had shamefully mistreated them. It is there- 
fore in keeping with history to recognize this uprising 
against Christians, because of false ideas of their work, 
as instigated by the father of lies, who has been the author 
of former persecutions as well. 

The Greek word for witness is "Martyr," and it has 
come to mean one who dies for his belief, simply because 
so many chose to do that rather than deny the Lord. The 
courage, joy and patience of martyrs have touched the 
hearts of millions, and their blood has truly been the seed 
of the Church ; and China like Europe, is to be blessed 
with an abundance of such testimony as will never cease 
to speak of the sincerity of the witness and the power of 
God to keep His people faithful and sustain them in trial. 
( To the Foreign Ministers the Empress Dowager was 
the de facto ruler of China, and that was enough for 
them. They also recognized that the Emperor, Kwang 
Hsu, was the de jure ruler, as they showed recently by 
insisting on being received in audience by him, and pro- 




EMPEROR KWANG-HSU. 

(From a recent photograph.) 



THE FUTURE OUTLOOK. I4I 

viding that it should be understood that the visit of their 
wives to the Empress Dowager was merely a social func- 
tion, with no political significance^ The Empress Dow- 
ager was one of the secondary wives of the Emperor 
Hsien Feng, and the mother of the Emperor Tung Chi. 
After the death of Tung Chi she acted as Regent during 
the minority of her nephew, t he present E mperor Kwa ng 
Hsu ; but as soon as he was old enough to take the reins 
of government her rights of ruler ceased entirely, and the 
legations knew, as well as every one else in China knew, 
that she was simply usurping the throne of Kwang Hsu, 
who was only kept alive because she feared the wrath of 
the people. 

The Emperor, as soon as he attained to years of dis- 
cretion, had begun to take an unexpected interest in the 
affairs of his great heritage. By chance thrown in the 
way of learning English, and deeply affected by the mis- 
erable part his country had played, determined to study 
for himself the cause of its sudden decadence, and to pre- 
pare himself for the task, determined to study the lan- 
guage of these wonderful Outlanders, who had proved 
themselves so far ahead in all the arts that serve to build 
up nations. 

(He recognized that what his country most required 
was an honest administration, yet about his Court there 
were few on whom he could depend. 

The war with Japan he saw had exposed the weakness 
of his country, and toward the removal of the foul blot , 
which that unhappy contest had exposed the young mon- 
arch devoted all his energies. He saw, as every sensible 
man has seen, that Japan owed her remarkable success to 
the manner in which she had assimilated the warlike les- * 



142 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

sons of the West, and that if China wished to emerge 
from her slough of despond she must adopt like meas- 
ures. \ He was statesman enough to comprehend that it 
was not in the mere imitation of foreign forms and prac- 
tices that Japan had been able tO' raise herself from in- 
significance to a position but little behind the first-class 
Powers, but that her real success lay in the careful manner 
in which she had studied and applied the springs of great- 
ness. What Japan had done China, he argued with him- 
self, could do ; and to this end he devoted all his ener- 
gies. To get rid of the ignoble crowd he saw was the 
first necessity, but it was equally necessary to surround 
himself with honest and capable men. 

The events succeeding the coup d'etat disclosed the 
men whom he had made his choice, and, compared with 
the crowd that surround the intruding ex-Regent, they 
are as Mght to darkness. ) Men like Kang and Chang may 
not have had the capacity or the knowledge to grasp the 
more complicated problems of State, but they were at 
least honest and earnest men — and honest and earnest 
men are just the want of the country, which has grown 
weary of the shifting and shallow opportunism of political 
jugglers. 

Unfortunately, Kwang Hsu worked without his host. 
He was too honest and earnest a man to believe that hu- 
man nature could sink to the depths it had done in the 
instance of the woman who had just laid down the Re- 
gency after years of failure and misgovernment. Fo" 
himself he bore no ill-will to the arch fiend who h-^'l 
blasted his life, but who had now, nominally at least, re- 
tired from the charge she had disgraced. But the woman 
who was to be superseded for her crimes recognized no 



THE FUTURE OUTLOOK. 143 

such lofty code of morals as did the young sovereign, 
and, apprehensive of the just punishment due to her in- 
iquities falling at last upon her head, seized the Emperor 
and confined him to an inner room and assumed herself 
thejreins of the government; 

England, the most inteTested of all the States having 
relations with China, weakly offered no objection, and 
stood humbly by while the tragedy was being prepared 
under her very eyes. 

The woman whom the misplaced indifference of the 
British Government permitted unchallenged to usurp the 
throne of China no sooner found herself in a position to 
do so than she turned all the venoni and spite of which 
even she was capable against England, joined h^nds_ with 
the Boxers against^the^worlc^— and all know the misery 
and death that have followed. 

With an Emperor who is weak in body and min d^and 
with the crafty and wickeT^Empress Dowager, what is 
the solution to this Chinese puzzle ? The almost universal 
opinion of all missionaries and a majority of all business 
men in China is that the Emperor should be restored to 
his throne and then surround him with men of the reform 
party and those who have shown a spirit of progression 
and wisdom. 

Now the settling day has come, and the nations have 
sent in a collective note, which virtually makes China a 
vassal to the world. This has been modified from time 
to time, and below we give a dispatch from Dr. Morrison, 
of Peking, to the London Times, under date of Dec. 20th, 
1900. It is as follows : 

"Equitable indemnity is to be paid to States, societies 
and individuals, and also to Chinese who have suffered 



144 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

injury on account of their employment by foreigners. 
China will adopt financial measures acceptable to the 
Powers to guarantee the payment of indemnity and the 
service loans." 

The Times correspondent says the note contains the 
following stipulations, in addition to those already cabled : 

"Reparation to Japan for the murder of Sugiyama. 

''Expiatory monuments erected in all foreign ceme- 
teries where tpmbs have been desecrated. 

"The posting of a proclamation throughout the empire 
for two years, enumerating the punishments inflicted upon 
the guilty officials, and threatening death to any one join- 
ing an anti-foreign society. 

"An imperial edict to be issued, holding Viceroys and 
Governors responsible for anti-foreign outbreaks or vio- 
lations of treaties. 

"China to undertake negotiations for a revision of the 
commercial treaties." 

Dr. Morrison goes on to say that in the discussion of 
the translation of the word "comply" in the British pro- 
posal not to remove the troops until the demands should 
be satisfied, one Minister suggested "accepter." The 
German Minister wanted "relimplir." Finally it was 
agreed to use the expression "se conformer d." 
I The original note, as given below, was far too severe, 
and could not possibly have been accepted : 

"Article i. An extraordinary mission, headed by an 
Imperial Prince, shall be sent to Berlin in order to ex- 
press the regret of the Emperor of China and of the 
Chinese Government for the murder of Baron Von Ket- 
teler. On the scene of the murder a monument worthy 
of the assagsinated Minister sh^U be erected^ with an in- 



THE future; outlook. 145 

scription in Latin, German and Chinese, expressing the 
regret of the Emperor of China. 

"Article 2. (a) The death penalty is to be inflicted on 
Princes Tuan and Chuang, upon Duke Lan, and, further, 
upon Ying-nien, Kang-yi, Chiao-Shu-Chioa, Tung-fuh- 




COUNT VON WALDERSEF. 

Siang, Yu-Hsien and other ringleaders, who will be 
named by the representatives of the Powers. 

"(b) In all places where foreigners have been killed 
or maltreated official examinations shall be suspended for 
five years. 

' "Article 3. The Chinese Government shall erect a 
monument in every foreign or international cemetery 
which has been desecrated or where the graves have been 
destroyed. 



146 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

''Article 4. The prohibition of the import of arms 
into China shall be maintained till further notice. 

''Article 5. China has to pay a just indemnity to 
Governments, corporations and individuals, as well as to 
those Chinese who suffered in the recent events in person 
or in property in consequence of being in the service of 
foreigners. 

"Article 6. Every single foreign Power is granted 
the right of maintaining a permanent legation guard and 
of placing the quarter of Peking where the legations are 
situated in a state of defense. Chinese are not to be al- 
lowed to live in that quarter of Peking. 

"Article 7. The Taku forts and those forts which 
might prevent free communication between Pekin and the 
sea shall be razed. 

"Article 8. The Powers acquire the right of occupy- 
ing certain points, on which they will agree among them- 
selves, with the object of maintaining free communica- 
tion between the capital and the sea. 

"Article 9. The Chinese Government is bound to post 
Imperial decrees for two years at all sub-prefectures. In 
these decrees (a) to belong to any anti-foreign sect is 
forever forbidden, under penalty of death; (b) the pun- 
ishments inflicted up'on the guilt}^ are recorded; (c) to 
prevent fresh disturbances, it is declared that the Vice- 
roys, as well as the provincial and local authorities, are 
made responsible for the maintenance of order in their 
districts. In the event of fresh anti-foreign disturbances 
or other infringements of the treaties which are not at 

once stopped and avenged by punishment of the guilty, 
these officials shall be promptly deposed and never again 

intrusted with official functions or invested with fresh 

dignities. 



THE future; outlook. 147 

"Article lo. The Chinese Government undertakes to 
enter upon negotiations with regard to such alterations 
in the existing commercial and navigation treaties as the 
foreign Governments consider to be desirable^ as well as 
regarding other matters which are concerned with facili- 
tating commercial relations. 

"Article ii. The Chinese Government shall be bound 
to reforra the Chinese Foreign Office and the court cere- 
monial for the reception of the foreign representatives, 
and to do so in the sense which shall be defined by the 
foreign Powers." 

The New York Daily Times gives a good editorial on 
it, and I can do no better than repeat it. It says : 

"It is of interest, first, to observe the nature and ex- 
tent of the penalties imposed on China as the direct 
atonement for the violent and outrageous acts commit- 
ted by her people and Government officials. We shall 
learn in that way what punishment the Alinisters thought 
commensurate with the wrongs they had suffered and 
within the pov/er of the nations to inflict. A graver in- 
terest attaches to the mieasures of securit}^ for future 
peaceful intercourse with China, for these, if executed, 
will determine the status and control the destiny of the 
great empire, and profoundly affect the history of the 
world. ' 

"The punitive clauses of the collective note require that 
an Imperial Prince shall conduct an extraordinary mis- 
sion lo Berlin to express the Emperor's regret at the 
murder of the German Minister, and that a monument 
shall be erected on the scene of the assassination, bearing 
an inscription in Latin, German and Chinese, a further 
and lasting expression of the Emperor's regret. In the 
place of this latter penalty and humiliation, the usage 



148 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

between Powers upon a footing of equality would pre- 
scribe a formal salute to the flag of the offended nation. 
But, as we shall see, the note is very far from treating 
China as an equal of the Powers. In the original draft 
of the note it was further provided that the death penalty 
should be inflicted upon Princes Tuan and Chuang, Duke 
Lan, Ying-Nien, Kang-Yi, Chiao-Shu-Chiao, Tung-fuh- 
Siang, Yu-Hsien, 'and other ringleaders, whose names 
will be given by the representatives of the Powers.' After 
this major demand the requirement that China shall pay 
a just indemnity to Governments, corporations and indi- 
viduals, and erect monuments in foreign cemeteries which 
have been desecrated, may be passed over as of subor- 
dinate interest. But it is now understood that 'severe 
punishment' has been substituted for the death penalty. 

"Guarantees of future security are exacted by pro- 
visions of the note demanding that the importation of 
arms into China shall be prohibited until further notice; 
that each Power may maintain a permanent legation guard 
in Peking and place in a state of defense the quarter 
where the legations are situated; that the Taku forts 
and all others commanding the approach to Peking from 
the sea shall be razed; that the Powers shall have the 
right to occupy points agreed upon among themselves 
for the purpose of keeping open communication to the 
capital ; that in all sub-prefectures the Imperial Govern- 
ment shall for two years post decrees proclaiming the 
penalty of death against all who belong to any anti-for- 
eign societies, recording the punishments inflicted for vio- 
lations of that decree, and making Viceroys and provin- 
cial and local authorities responsible for public order, 
under penalty of degradation for life; that the Chinese 
Government shall enter into negotiations for the amend- 




EARL LI — THE STATESMAN. 



THE future: outlook. I5I 

ment of commercial treaties, and that the Government 
shall be bound to reform, in a manner determined by the 
Powers, the Tsung-Li Yamen, or Foreign Office, and 
the Court ceremonial for the reception of foreign Min- 
isters. 

"China ceases to be a sovereign nation the moment she 
assents in principle or detail to these demands. It is evi- 
dent that a Power that permits other Powers to step in 
and prescribe her internal laws is no longer sovereign, 
independent and equal with the rest. She has become 
subordinate, she is controlled from without. Under the 
present Manchu dynasty of Ta-tsing (sublime purity) 
the laws of the empire are contained in the Ta-tsing 
Pluei-tien, or code of the dynasty, and the administration 
of public affairs is committed to the Interior Council, 
under whose orders the seven boards of Government act, 
corresponding tO' our departments at Washington. The 
laws and customs to be observed by the people are en- 
forced by the Li-Pu board. 

''We may suppose that the subjects of the Emperor are 
reasonably contented with the liberties they enjoy under 
this system. It is sufficiently manifest that one of their 
privileges in the past has been membership in anti-for- 
eign societies. Now come the Powers with their col- 
lective note demanding that they shall be permitted to 
amend the municipal law of China in such a way that 
the exercise of forrner privileges shall be made a crime 
punishable with death. China manifestly abrogates her 
sovereignty in permitting the limits of the privileges of 
her subjects to be traced by foreigners, and it is further 
evident that neither she nor all the Powers together would 
have the abilitv to enforce the decree save at absolutelv 



152 CHINA -AND THE BOXERS. 

prohibitory cost. In the text of the collective note as 
made public by Count Von Buelow last month, the de- 
mands were declared to be irrevocable. It is now re- 
ported that this word has been stricken out — that is, the 
terms are open to discussion between the Powers and 
China. In the interest of peace and the taxpayers, upon 
whom falls the ultimate burden of attempting to enforce 
the unenforcible, it is fortunate that the views of the 
Ministers are made subject to revision. 

''At the same time, it is plain that a momentous event 
in the historical development of the nations of the world 
is ipreparing to be accomplished. The overthrow of the 
Manchu dynasty and the restoration of pure Chinese Gov- 
ernment might save the empire and make the loss of 
sovereignty a temporary misfortime. This is improbable. 
The Chinese are doubtless about tO' lose the right of the 
free hand in regulating their internal and external af- 
fairs. Subjugation will only hasten decay, and in the case 
of a vast and undeveloped empire in this age of active 
public conquest and private exploitation, when the drones 
and the incapables are being driven out of their fallow 
estates by the busy and eager workers, decay will be ar- 
rested not far in the future by dismemberment, partition, 
and the industrial dominance of the men of the living 
nations." 

Probably never before has an international question of 
such moment been before the whole world, and it will 
need cool heads to keep this caldron from boiling over, as 
jealousy and greed is lurking around. China herself 
needs a strong man, who will command respect from the 
law-abiding people. By showing great tact the country 
could be brought out of this chaos and anarchy. 



THE FUTURE OUTLOOK. 



153 



What if China is divided? Well, if this is brought 
about, she must go ahead. The conservative China has 
gone, and gone forever. If the Emperor is reinstated or 
not, there will be a reconstructed China. All her material 
conditions will be changed for the better. She will rise 
in the scale of nationhood ; her foreign relations, her 
financial system, her judicial administration will be lifted 
immensely above the level where they are now. New soil 
is always wonderfully rich. Old people, once emanci- 




ADMIRAL SEYMOUR. 



pated from old ideas, will grow new ideas with an ex- 
uberance unwonted. The Japanese are an illustration of 
this. The Chinese, once started in the same way, will 
move at a slower gait, but will surpass them in the scale 
of magnitude. 



154 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

It must be remembered that her natural resources have 
hardly been touched. Her immense coal fields and min- 
erals of every kind await developing. Her forests will 
need the rotary saw instead of the slow hand saw ; for as 
yet she has no other. Her harvests will demand the 
Western harvester and threshing machine, instead of the 
tedious hand work oi to-day. And so in every industry 
there will be demands for all the latest and best ma- 
chinery. Railways also will be needed to hasten travel 
and carry the produce to the markets. The great steam- 
ship lines are waking up to see the possibility of China's 
coming greatness, and have already in course of construc- 
tion the largest ships in the world to carry the freight 
which is sure to come to and from China. 

Not only will there be a new material China, but there 
will also be a regenerated China. A p'urely materialistic 
China, well equipped ironclads and Mauser rifles, and no 
ascendancy of moral force, would be a curse to herself 
and a menace to mankind. God has something far better 
in store for humanity. By a regenerate China is not 
meant that all China will be converted ; far from it as yet ; 
but it is meant that Christianity will soon move with gi- 
gantic strides. 

Drawbacks and checks there will be, but, allowing for 
them all, after taking into account the nature of the 
Chinese people, once emancipated from their slavish al- 
legiance tO' their literary class, considering that they have 
no Indian caste to keep them back, counting as we do on 
the mighty power of God to be provident in the last days, 
now just ahead of us, we are safe in assuming that there 
will be such ingatherings as the world has never seen. 
We had a little forerunner of this two years ago, when 



^^F^^^ 




SIR CLAUD MACDONALD, BRITISH 
MINISTER TO PEKING. 



156 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

the famous reform edicts of the Emperor came out. Im- 
mediately missionary work grew immensely interesting, 
and many who had been secretly serving Christ came out 
and openly accepted Him. The oppression of the gentry 
and officials became less and less, until the Emperor was 
dethroned, and then the cloud settled down once more. 
The foreigner's power has been felt, and will in the fu- 
ture be respected. This, in turn, will have the effect of 
causing the Chinese to respect the foreigner and his 
teaching, and we feel sure missionaries will not need to 
work so hard to get people into the Church as to keep 
them out; for the Chinaman, like the Westerner, desires 
to be connected with those who are in high favor. 
Teachers in English will be in demand everywhere, as 
the English language is the preferred one by the Chinese. 
The editor of the Educational Department in the Chi- 
nese Recorder wisely calls the attention of the educa- 
tionists to the necessity of improving the present time to 
prepare for what must inevitably follow when peace has 
been declared. ''There is little question but that we shall 
see such a demand for English and education in modern 
studies and on modern lines as will quite overwhelm the 
missionary body. We were almost wholly unprepared, 
when the Emperor's reform decrees were issued, for the 
results which followed. And now that reform, in earnest, 
will doubtless be the cry when matters have again settled 
down, what a pressure will be brought upon the mission- 
ary body, not alone for direct evangelistic work, but es- 
pecially for help in founding schools and conducting edu- 
cational institutions. Well may every missionary ask 
himself. What can I do in the present crisis to prepare 
for the great reactionary wave of progress and reform 
which is sure to set in?" 



JUl^ S 



THE FUTURE OUTLOOK. 157 

The missionaries who have retired for a time will go 
back refreshed in body and spirit, and, therefore, prepared 
for the great work which will be crowded upon them. 
New churches and homes will have to be built to take the 
place of those destroyed, and the friends, therefore, at 
home will have to stand behind their respective boards, 
both in prayer and financial aid, to help tide over this 
time of severe strain. The promise of Isaiah that they 
shall come from the land of Sinim (China) will surely 
come true, for God's word cannot fail. Weeping may 
endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. The 
light is breaking over China to-day. God's servants 
should not be slow in claiming all the land. The doors 
of iron and brass are now creaking on their rusty hinges, 
and the missionary must not be discouraged, but en- 
ter in. 

Thus we may conclude that in the events in China our 
Father is making "All things work together for good to 
them that love God." We may have to take this by faith 
for a time for as far as the outward vision now is all 
looks dark. The final joint note has been delivered and 
has gone to the peace envoys, Ching and Li. The inser- 
tion of the word "irrevocable" makes the note, not a 
basis of discussion, but an ultimatum. The nations are 
making the attempt to coerce China into the acceptance 
of the terms which she should not be asked to accept. 
An easier way could have been found and the ringleaders 
amply punished if the nations had so desired ; but now it 
looks as though they have added fuel to the fire. 

Let every Christian worker pray much that this black 
cloud hanging over China may soon lift and that peace 



158 CHINA AND THE BOXERS. 

and prosperity in a greater, fuller form may return to 
the land that we teachers, traders and missionaries have 
learned to love. 






jtfarv 51 i' 



///> 



JAN 11 1901 



